The USSR and Asia-Pacific in 1990

Abstract

In Soviet foreign policy, 1990 will probably be remembered as the Year of Germany. The political, economic, and strategic aspects of German reunification were obviously of vital importance to the USSR, requiring the special attention of top Soviet leaders and their personal involvement in the negotiations on the subject with leaders of the Federal Republic of Germany, the United States, Britain, France, and their NATO allies, as well as consultations with Moscow's own East European allies. Soviet-American relations continued to be high on the Soviet foreign policy list of priorities in 1990, with now almost routine summit meetings and regular consultations between the foreign ministers of both countries. And starting in August, the events in the Persian Gulf commanded continuous attention from the Soviet leadership and required subsequent fundamental adjustments in Soviet foreign policy plans. Under such conditions one may assume that Soviet relations with Asian Pacific countries during the year were bound to be relegated to the bottom of Soviet foreign policy priorities. Indeed, there were no dramatic events in Soviet Eastern policy in 1990 comparable in importance to Mikhail Gorbachev's visit to Beijing the previous year. And yet 1990 was very rich with significant movements and maneuvers undertaken by Moscow in the Asia-Pacific area, including exchanges of high-level visits and the conclusion of numerous intergovernmental agreements with Moscow's counterparts there. In other words, the Soviet Union being an Euroasian power, historically and geographically as well as ethnically, could not afford to neglect its broad political and economic interests in Asia-Pacific even for a year. And its Eastern foreign policy, being an integral part of the overall Soviet foreign policy, continued to pursue quite concrete objectives in this region. Thus, Soviet policy in 1990 was a logical continuation and implementation of the Asian Pacific doctrine basically formulated by Gorbachev in his