er Moonie setbacks, this may have struckrnthe neoconservative leadership as the opportunerntime to discipHne an embarrassingrnpatron.rnMy own reading of the about-face isrnmore compHcated. Contrary to a widespreadrnfiction, rank-and-file Unificationistsrnare neither stupid nor passive.rnThough their theology offends Christiansrnand their agenda should disturb anyrnEurocentric traditionalist, most UnificationistsrnI have met are civil, morally engaged,rnand intellectually more curiousrnthan professors of my acquaintance.rnWhen I worked for the WashingtonrnTimes Corporation, my Unificationistrncolleagues worked harder and appearedrnless programmed than did the minicons,rnwho were given more money but had norninterest in ideas, only in “our positions.”rnThe neoconservative diatribes againstrnthe Unification Church resemble thernkind of backbiting heard when secondgenerationrnneocons congregated in therncafeteria of the Washington Times tornmake fun of the more earnest but lessrnprivileged Moonies who did not have therngood sense to be born with influentialrnparents.rnTwo closing observations may be appropriate.rnFirst, as a chronicler of neoconrnchutzpah, it seems to me unlikelyrnthat the shots in question were random.rnNeocon broadsides launched in expensivernnational publications are always actsrnof deliberation. They do not take place,rnas their victims have learned, becausernsome pimple-faced kid is having a goodrntime. Moreover, views that would upsetrnthe Kristol-Podhoretz rete, such as praisernof the Israeli Labor Party or kind wordsrnabout Germans, would not get into thernsame publications, except as a feeble attemptrnat balance assigned to a guest contributor.rnF’urthermore, whatever recent developmentsrnhave fueled the neocon assaultsrnon a longtime patron, the assaults themselvesrnare an act of bullying. Neoconsrnhave a history’ of serving notice to thosernwho help them but are not fully partrnof their communit}’. Thus 11 years agornCommentary, in an essay by JamesrnNeuchterlein, brought up the charge ofrnright-wing extiemism against William F.rnBuckley and his progenitors. ThoughrnBuckley was commended for moving towardrnpatriotic moderation “since thernfifties,” there was a time, Neuchterleinrnpointed out ominously, when his viewsrnmight have been seen to skirt a dangerousrnextreme. Such bullying is reminiscentrnof how Soviet communists dealtrnwith Western fellow travelers in need ofrnreproof A permanent aspect of neoconrnpolitics, this ideological bully ragging is arnmethod of commanding unconditionalrnloyalty from allies who are perceived asrnbeing on the outside but having nowherernto go. Rupert Murdoch, take note.rnPaul Gottfried is a professor of humanitiesrnat EUzabethtown College in Elizabethtown,rnPennsylvania.rnFOREIGN AFFAIRSrnLebed in Siberiarnby Denis Petrovrni.i The situation in Krasnoyarsk,”rnopined Communist Partyrn(CPRF) boss Gennadi Zyuganov, “isrnreminiscent of Germany in the 1930’s.”rnFascism, claimed the national Bolshevikrnboss, who should know a thing or twornabout the subject, is threatening Russia,rnincubating in a Siberian womb. He wasrnnot alone in making such dubiousrncharges. In fact, in the days leading up tornthe April 26 gubernatorial election inrnKrasnoyarsk Kray, a vast, mineral-rich regionrnstretching from the Arctic to thernChinese border, a flock of the Moscowrnpolitical and financial elite’s leadingrnsongbirds descended on the unsuspectingrn—and long-suffering—inhabitantsrnof the kray, chirping their praises ofrnthe well-connected incumbent, ValerirnZubov (local representative of what Russiansrncall the “party of power”), andrndamning his opponent, a much-decoratedrnformer general of Airborne Troops,rnAleksandr Lebed. The flock includedrnMoscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov who, asrnthe boss-in-chief of Russia’s equivalent ofrnTammany Hall, sees Lebed as an “extremist.”rnLuzhkov intends to poach onrnLebed’s populist-nationalist electoralrnfield come the presidential elections inrn2000, and he will be one of the big losersrnif the Lebed juggernaut continues to rollrnin the direction of Moscow.rnAt times it seemed as if Zubov hadrnturned over the campaign to the folksrnwho really run things and who appear tornbe hysterical at the prospect of Lebed usingrna Krasnoyarsk base to launch a politicalrnassault on the Kremlin. They shouldrnbe: Lebed carried the May 17 run-off inrnKrasnoyarsk by nearly 20 percent, blowingrnZubov away by a count of 57 percentrnto 38 percent, in spite of a seeminglyrnendless barrage of anti-Lebed propagandarnand not-so-veiled threats that Moscowrnwould do its best to “suffocate” the region,rnas one wag put it, should the prolesrndisobey the ukase of Boris I, otherwisernknown as the “Father of Russian Democracy.”rnEvery elite-delivered smear onlyrnappeared to help Lebed.rnReaders of Chronicles already knowrnthe general. Lebed looks like the realrnMcCoy, an honest, straight-talking manrnof the people with a voice as deep as LakernBaikal, a build like a gladiator (Lebedrnonce pounded his foes in the ring as arnheavyweight boxer), and a mug like arnSlavic Jack Palance. His commandingrnpresence, reputation for integrity, andrnwillingness to take personal responsibilityrnfor seemingly impossible tasks (thernword in Moscow is that Yeltsin gavernLebed, then secretary of the Russian Securit}’rnCouncil, the nod to negotiate anrnend to the Chechen War in 1996 hopingrnthat he would fail; he didn’t, thus, he hadrnto go) is often judged by Russians as evidencernthat Lebed is krutiy—a word thatrndenotes a special quality of persistencernand toughness. Campaigning amongrnthe people—his people—Lebed is in hisrnelement, mixing easily with workers,rnpeasants, soldiers, and priests. “Siberiansrnare differenf from other Russians, saysrnLebed. “Serfdom never existed here,”rnthus there is a special sense of “freedomrnand endurance” to the Siberians.rnIt will be good ground for the kind ofrnexperiment Lebed wants to conduct.rnHis campaign is a run against Moscowrnand the political-financial oligarchy thatrnruns it. In the Federation Council, thernupper chamber of parliament consistingrnof regional governors, Lebed intends tornlaunch a direct assault on the capital: hernplans to propose that enterprises payrntheir taxes not in Moscow, where mostrnhave their headquarters and, by Russianrnlaw, pay taxes, but in the region they operaternin. This would strip Luzhkov of arnlucrative source of funds to pilfer andrncould shift the locus of trade and investmentrn(85 percent of much-needed foreignrninvestment in Russia now goes tornthe “center,” Moscow) to the hinterlands.rnLebed further proposes to cut taxesrnfor Russian producers, thus hoping tornAUGUST 1998/4.3rnrnrn