ABSTRACT
The arab spring caught Russia, as it did the United States and indeed the rulers of the countries affected, unawares. As far as the Russian leadership was concerned, there appeared to be some initial concern that the revolutions in the Arab world could spread to Russia as well. In a visit to Brussels in late February, Vladimir Putin took pride in pointing to Russia as a reliable natural gas supplier. Because of a serious drought in Russia in 2010, Putin had declared a ban on wheat exports in August 2010, thereby considerably complicating Egypt's efforts to import the grain because Russia had accounted for more than half of Egypt's wheat imports before the embargo. If Russia hoped to make gains in Tunisia and Egypt, it sought to avoid losses in Libya and Syria, whose regimes were seriously challenged by the Arab Spring. The Russian leadership may have remembered the "Death to Russia" signs carried by antiregime demonstrators in Iran in 2009.
