Boris Yeltsin's opportunity

Boris Yeltsin's confrontation with Parliament has given the Russian leader an unexpected opportunity to clean out the benighted high command of Moscow's military and internal security forces.

His response will tell a great deal about whether he has the heart to revive his faltering presidency and provide the enlightened leadership Russia so badly needs.

The Kremlin chessboard is well set for Yeltsin to make a move. Last week, Parliament approved a motion of no confidence in the Yeltsin government to protest Moscow's handling of the Chechen attack on the southern Russian city of Budennovsk earlier this month.

To win a second motion that Parliament plans to consider on Saturday, Yeltsin asked for offers of resignation from Defense Minister Pavel Grachev, Interior Minister Viktor Yerin, Federal Security Service chairman Sergei Stepashin, and Vice Premier Nikolai Yegorov. Whether or not he will accept any of them is another question, and a much more important one.

In the carefully calculated strategy Yeltsin is following, the offers alone should be enough to placate lawmakers angered by Moscow's response to the Chechen attack and temporary seizure of 2,000 hostages. The vote of no confidence last week was not binding; a second would force Yeltsin to form a new government or dismiss Parliament and call new legislative elections.

Yeltsin is betting that the parliamentarians, not willing to risk the loss of their seats and the perquisites that go with them, will be satisfied by the resignation gesture and drop their challenge.

That may be smart politics, but it will be bad governance if Yeltsin stops there and fails to replace the four men. Grachev distinguished himself in the August 1991 coup attempt by refusing to carry out orders to attack Yeltsin's headquarters and crush pro-democracy demonstrations. But his service since has been unimpressive. He has mismanaged the contraction of Russian military forces, leaving a demoralized, undisciplined army, and endorsed the brutal Russian offensive against Chechnya.

The three other officials have played central roles in the Chechen campaign and pushed for repressive measures to deal with other ethnic minorities in Russia. Like Grachev, they are members of an inner circle of security advisers who have hardened Russian foreign and domestic policies in recent months.

Yeltsin can cleanse his government and break out of the bunker psychology that has twisted his leadership if he can see beyond the politics of the moment and discharge four men who no longer do a service to him or their country.

-- The New York Times