"In the meantime all the forests burned down"

Not only is the European Union satisfied with signing up a communist dictatorship to its new space navigation system, Galileo, it has now cemented a co-operation agreement with Russia. This will increase ties between Galileo and Russia's incomplete equivalent, GLONASS. Co-operation in space is usually viewed as a benign activity, fostering 'soft power' relationships. The development of Galileo is viewed in a harsher light as the creation has been seen as a rival to the GPS satellite navigation system created by the United States. The potential military applications are noticeable, especially when they are available to countries that do not share a love of democracy. The European Union is noted for its lack of fussiness in partnerships.

The European Union is aware of its increasing dependence upon Russia as a source of energy. A new treaty is being negotiated for 2007, dealing with security and energy ties, replacing the co-operative agreement with the Soviet Union. The old ties are now obsolete.

"We might be actually acting side by side in far away places, like Sudan, under UN auspices," Russian ambassador to the EU, Vladimir Chizhov, said in an interview with EUobserver on Thursday (9 March).

"Whether one likes it or not, in the mid-term perspective, that is in the next 15 to 30 years, the percentage of EU demand covered by supplies from Russia will grow," he indicated.

Mr Chizhov dubbed the new legal pact a "Strategic Partnership Treaty (SPT)" envisaging a slim framework document backed up by action-oriented instruments.

"The issue at stake is not a new energy treaty...but a new treaty that would summarise Russia-EU relations and this can replace the existing Partnership and Cooperation Agreement [PCA]."

The laughable vision of Russian conscripts deployed alongside EU soldiers too scared to get their hands dirty in the hellholes of the world is fantastic. In reality, the Russians are no strangers to european bureaucracy, as this episode in Bosnia demonstrates:

EU-Russian crisis work has also been frustrated by Brussels red tape in the past. 

The Bosnian police agreement took one year to write and the last two months were spent in "endless discussions" on whether it should be in English only or English and Russian.

"Our partners on the EU side of the table said, since Russian is not an official language of the EU, you can't have it. This is stupid."

Russian helicopters were ready to take off in 24 hours to help France but it took seven days to get overflight clearance from EU transit states.

"In the meantime all the forests burned down," the ambassador indicated. "Today the EU lacks a coordinated system of civilian emergency response."

Europe is about to find that they need Russia more than Russia needs them. Tensions in the Near Abroad will soon ease, as the European Union gags the OSCE and allows its larger partners to place realpolitik above democracy. Moldova, Belarus and the Ukraine will find a cold response to their westward orientation: a final betrayal from the Cold War. Tell me again, how did the appeasers win?