Russian tanks crush hopes of Moscow liberal agenda

By Michael Stott - Analysis

MOSCOW (Reuters) - The Russian tanks which rolled into Georgia this month did not just crush a troublesome former Soviet neighbour. They also squashed hopes of a more liberal agenda back home in Moscow.

Kremlin leader Dmitry Medvedev, an Internet-savvy 42-year-old former corporate lawyer, took office in May pledging to fight corruption and lawlessness at home, promote democracy and set a softer tone overseas.

Medvedev's arrival aroused hopes among Western powers of a more liberal, investor-friendly Kremlin after what they saw as eight years of eroding democracy and hawkish foreign policy under his predecessor and mentor Vladimir Putin.

Those hopes lasted just three months.

Then Moscow unleashed its biggest show of military might since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union to crush an attack by neighbouring Georgia on the pro-Russian separatist province of South Ossetia.

Now, the Kremlin chief's complex, lawyerly phrases have given way to the clipped expletives of a military leader.

"Bastard" and "lunatic" have entered the Medvedev vocabulary, and the rule of law has given way to the rule of war.

Showing a tough streak that seemed unthinkable only a month earlier, Medvedev promised war veterans in televised comments that Russia would deliver a "crushing response" to any future aggressor.