MOSCOW SHOWDOWN : Voices

“Russia’s democracy has learned a hard lesson. It is that democracy must be able to defend itself, and have enough strength to do it.”

--Vyacheslav Kostikov, Yeltsin spokesman

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“What this will do is remind Europeans in a very rude way of the fact that there are still some very serious dangers out there. . . . Whenever there is real unrest in the East, it will make people tend to look to Washington again.’

--Martin Van Heuven, senior consultant, RAND Corp.

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“He (Boris Yeltsin) has bent over backwards not to have the soldiers fire on anybody, not to promote any violence. And he may be thinking today he went too far. Because they basically got up a head of steam and the situation got out of control.”

--President Clinton

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“If democracy wins in Russia, this will have an important influence on the current democratic process in Georgia.”

--Eduard A. Shevardnadze, leader of Georgia

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“I think that now they will be more ready to come to agreement with the president because he has showed his strength.”

--Sergei Stankevich, Yeltsin adviser

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“As dramatic as all of this has been, it is essentially still a crisis over preconditions, because the deeper agenda of that country has not been addressed. To the extent that Russia has made progress in the last year or two, it’s been largely spontaneous. . . . Unless Russia can successfully begin dealing with that underlying agenda, then in the long run we will see new crises and new headlines.”

--Robert Legvold, professor of political science, Columbia University

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“It’s the government’s fault, though, for not acting more forcefully sooner.”

--Sergei Trifonov, Moscow computer scientist

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President Clinton “put himself out on the limb in a way that doesn’t strike me as wise. It’s not a question of whether you support Yeltsin, it’s how you support Yeltsin. We didn’t have any choice but to support Yeltsin. (But) we should be careful in the future about assuming that everyone opposed to Yeltsin is opposed to reform.”

--Jerry F.Hough, senior fellow, Brookings Institution

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“Yeltsin created a situation where naturally he had nothing else to do but drive them out.”

--Alexandra Lokteva, a retired Russian economist

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“Democratization, in view of what’s happened, is going to have a rocky road in Russia. (President Clinton’s actions are) a series of forced moves, since there are no credible alternatives to Yeltsin whom we could conceivably back.”

--Gabriel Schoenfeld, senior fellow, Center for Strategic and International Studies

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“Those people inside don’t seem to know what a paratrooper assault regiment really is.”

--A paratrooper to bystanders on his way toward Russian White House