Kerry, Lavrov and Kafka

The meeting with Lavrov was Kafka-esque, as if from another planet, said the head of American diplomacy.

Diplomacy is as much an art of speech as it is an art of refraining from comments. Not everything, after all, can be said when you are a representative of the people — though Polish members of parliament seem to have a different opinion on that. It is a whole other thing what you say behind closed doors when you are with your own people. Then, you can let go and say whatever is on your mind. The only problem is that often “your people” are not really “yours” — or they just like to talk … or record. The walls have ears, and then we get leaks — the little windows that allow us to take a peek behind the scenes of big (or indeed small) politics.

Recent times, largely courtesy of various services, have been very rich in such windows. Today, we have had another interesting one. The leak is interesting because its main protagonist, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, and the situation are interesting; because the leak comes from the semi-official meeting, behind closed doors, of the Trilateral Commission, a conference of the business and political elites of Europe, America and Asia, which — if you believe the conspiracy theory supporters (whom I am not instigating) — rules the world, together with the Bilderberg group (Nota bene: Among the invited are six Poles — four people connected with Agora, Marek Belka and Andrzej Olechowski.)

The leak, disclosed by the portal The Daily Beast — a tape recording of Kerry’s speech during the commission’s meeting — is also interesting because of its content: Kerry reportedly compared Israeli policies to apartheid, and also reportedly admitted that U.S. intelligence had been listening in on the conversations of Donetsk separatists who were getting their orders straight from Moscow.

Equally interesting, however, is what he said about his experiences with Sergey Lavrov, the famously insolent Russian minister of foreign affairs. Kerry’s feelings strongly support this view, and so do the many experiences in dealing with Russia, despite which Americans still have trouble believing that Russia is not a “normal” country that plays by the normal, civilized rules.

“Right now there is not a negotiation; there is a confrontation. I’m sad to report I’ve never seen such a complete, miserable, unaccountable, disgraceful walk away from a set of promises and understandings than what has taken place,” Kerry said. “I’ve had six conversations with Lavrov in the last weeks. The last one was Kafka-esque, it was other planet, it was just bizarre. Nobody is better at telling you that red is blue and black is white… That’s what we are dealing with.”

Poor John.