Lebed the "swan" fell victim to the "snipe"

THE documents produced by Russia's Interior Minister, Gen Anatoly Kulikov, to show that Gen Alexander.

Lebed was planning a military coup are nothing of the sort.

Neither were they "discovered" as part of an Interior Ministry operation to lay bare the secret machinations of the sacked Russian security chief. They did, however, show a strongly authoritarian and anti democratic side of Gen Lebed about which many had strong suspicions.

Proposals to form a "Russian Legion" were in fact sent by Gen Lebed to Gen Kulikov two months ago as part of a discussion document on the formation of an anticrime task force.

The document displayed an entirely ruthless attitude to those considered to be a "threat to state security" and bluntly proposed methods for their "liquidation". It must be assumed that since a 50,000 strong force was to be created for this purpose the term "liquidation" was meant in its absolutely literal sense.

In stopping the formation of this force, Gen Kulikov may have done his country a service, but the likelihood is that he did the right thing for all the wrong reasons.

Gen Kulikov and Gen Lebed were by no means birds of a feather.

Lebed, whose name means Swan, was large in name and nature and presented himself as a leader whose character was as unblemished as the down of the bird after which he was named. He also presented a large and immobile target.

Kulikov, whose name means Snipe, has managed to fly in several directions at the same time depending on the way the political wind has shifted and, so far at least, has contrived to stay out of the sights of those who would like to see him plummet to earth.

The Snipe had the Swan's documents for almost two months before expressing any disagreement with their content. Only when another, major row broke out between the two did Kulikov appear on the "Independent" NTV channel with the papers in his hand before a compliant anchorman, Yevgeni Kiselyov, whose name has intimations of an amorphous jelly.

The programme on which the two men appeared bears the intriguing title Hero of the Day indicating that, its content is not intended to show Kiselyov's guests in a poor light. In his capacity as hero Gen Kulikov pointed out that an armed coup, albeit a "creeping" one, was under way.

The public had been warned and next day President Yeltsin himself appeared on television to sign the warrant for Gen Lebed's dismissal before millions of viewers. The gesture had the advantage, not only of getting rid of Gen Lebed, but of showing that the President was fit enough, although apparently only just, to sign decrees by himself.

Moscow had been coming down with rumours that Mr Yeltsin's chief of staff, Mr Anatoly Chubais, was using a rubber stamp of the President's signature to promulgate decrees of his own.

Television, therefore, bad done its duty to Russia once again. It is the only medium through which effective political campaigning can be done in a country whose newspapers and magazines have suffered a collapse in readership and distribution.

In Mr Yeltsin's election campaign the state controlled channels and NTV, whose director general, Mr Igor Malashenko, became a media adviser to the President, were so biased in their coverage that they drew adverse comments from the OSCE's team of international observers.

THE programme schedules have not been altered. Since his sacking Gen Lebed has received negative coverage.

He has been linked with extreme right wing organisations. Good Russians have been shown welcoming his dismissal and bad Chechens deploring it.

Mr Kiselyov's remarkable achievement in the murky scenario had been to uncover his second "coup d'etat" of the year. In June when two supporters of the President were arrested while taking a bag with $500,000 out of the Moscow White House, he went on air in an emergency edition to say that a coup was under way.

Next day the head of the ESB (successor of the KGB), Gen Mikhail Barsukov, and the chief of Mr Yeltsin's bodyguard, Gen Alexander Korzhakov, who had been associated with the arrests rather than the smuggling out of the money, were fired.

The sackings of these highly unpopular men along with the appointment of the popular Gen Lebed did a great deal to help Mr Yeltsin win the elections later that month. After his victory it was announced that the franchise for the country's fourth national television channel would be given to Kiselyov's employer, NTV.

Once the bete noire of the establishment and the supporter of the liberal politician Mr Grigory Yavlinsky, NTV is now as firmly in the camp of the Yeltsin administration as are the state controlled channels ORT and RTR.