"...time after time, their plans go awry."

Siberian Light has an interesting post today discussing an article in the Guardian alleging that Russia is sheltering Bosnian war ciminals. The commentary by Andy is right on target:

So far there has been no comment from Russia regarding these allegations. I'm fairly certain that they'll turn out to be true, though. Russia has been suspected of harbouring war criminals for a while and I'm only surprised it has taken this long for evidence to come out. If the allegations really are true, the only word I think of to describe Russia's actions is 'stupid'. [...]

The whole idea of harbouring war criminals seems to be indicative of a general trend in Russian foreign policy of short-sighted short-termism. Time after time Russia is making stupid foreign policy decisions and blithely assuming that things will go well. This wouldn't be such a problem if there was someone in their Foreign Ministry had the ability to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. Sadly though, there isn't anybody in Russia with that ability and, time after time, their plans go awry.

This can also be seen as an example of Russia playing on one side of an issue abroad (in this case, signing the Dayton Agreement and supporting the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia) and on the opposite side at home. One could argue that harboring ethnic Serb war criminals is equal parts foreign and domestic policy, insofar as it plays to the Slavic nationalist base. Although this specific instance of pan-Slavic support is obviously not something that has been publicized before, I am sure that if the issue gets substantial coverage it will be turned by political groups like Rodina into another excuse for anti-Western rhetoric.