Twelve things about the flurry of pronouncements and announcements over the past several days about the Russians and whether they will or won’t be at the Paris Summer Games in 2024.
OK, 11 about the Russians and one about Salt Lake City.
The Russians and Salt Lake. They’re the Olympic gifts that keep giving.
1. Don’t delude yourself. Don’t be naive. Don’t be a hater, either. The Russians will almost surely be in Paris in 2024. Except they won’t be identified as Russians. They will be neutrals. The way they typically had been at World Athletics meets — something like ANA, or Authorized Neutral Athlete.
Belarus, too, but for purposes of this discussion, it’s simpler just to mean both and just say “the Russians.”
IOC President Thomas Bach amid last week’s meetings // IOC/ Greg Martin
2. Why will they be there? Because the IOC’s mission is to bring the athletes of the world together to try to help further a more peaceful world. This means all the athletes. All means all. You can’t throw a party and invite only the people you like. That’s not a practical way of advancing the IOC mission.
3. To understand the future, the way toward Paris, it is imperative to look to the past, to the 1980 U.S.-led boycott of the Moscow Games.
In 1976, at the Montreal Games, West German fencer Thomas Bach won Olympic gold in the team foil event. But for the U.S.-led boycott in 1980, there was every chance the West German team would have, should have, won another Olympic medal in Moscow, perhaps gold.
Bach was among the athlete leaders — the American Anita DeFrantz, too — who fought the boycott. They were unsuccessful.
The next year, Bach and others, among them Seb Coe, now the head of World Athletics, were invited to speak at the IOC Congress in Baden-Baden, West Germany. This was the precursor of what is now the IOC athletes’ commission. Bach has said many times that the lesson of the Moscow boycott is twofold:
One, athletes had no real voice. Two, the IOC had almost no influence in the real world.
When you understand that a huge chunk of his professional life has been devoted to changing those two particular things, then you understand that the 1980 boycott is, for Bach, a living thing. Truly, it influences him every single day.
No way — absolutely no way — is he going to consign any athlete anywhere to what happened to him in 1980. This includes, in our time, the Russians.
This is why, under various names, the Russians appeared in 2018, 2020/1 and 2022. So see you, too, in Paris in 2024.
4. If you have been paying attention to what Bach has been saying in his very public speeches over the past few months, he has been making this loud and clear.
In September, Bach, at the Vatican:
“While we are determined to strive for peace, we have to be realistic about our limitations. We know that sport alone cannot create peace. We cannot take decisions on war and peace — this is under the exclusive authority of politics.
“And yet, knowing that we operate within these limitations, there is a unique pathway to peace for us. This pathway is about bringing people together in peace and solidarity.
“This is our role: to support and strengthen the pathway to peace; to foster and promote understanding and solidarity between people and nations.”
Then, notably: “What applies to Ukraine also applies to other members of our Olympic community. We are a global organization. This is why we are supporting the Olympic communities in Afghanistan, Yemen and the too many other places affected by wars and conflicts around the world.”
In November, Bach, at the G20 Leaders’ Summit in Bali:
“Olympic sport needs the participation of all athletes who accept the rules, even and especially if their countries are in confrontation or at war. A competition between athletes from only like-minded states is not a credible symbol of peace.
“In this age of division, our role is clear: to unite the world — and not to deepen divisions.”
5. IOC releases typically speak in code. It’s fun to decipher the code. Who, among others, was on the guest list for the Olympic Summit last Friday? Among other luminaries, the presidents of three, and only three, national Olympic committees: Gao Zhidan of China; Susanne Lyons and Gene Sykes of the United States, Lyons the outgoing chair of the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee, Sykes the incoming; and Stanislav Pozdnyakov of Russia. Note the last of the three, please.
Pozdnyakov has been president of the Russian Olympic Committee since 2018.
Do you really invite someone to a meeting like that and then go, hey, you’re awful? Of course not.
On top of which, Pozdnyakov was probably the most awesome male saber fencer in the world in the 1990s and early 2000s. He has four Olympic golds and one bronze.
Pozdnyakov’s daughter, Sofia, is Tokyo Games individual saber gold medalist.
The Pozdnyakovs are fencing royalty.
The Olympic world is grounded in relationships. Bach’s Olympic gold is in which event, please?
Thank you, let’s move along.
6. Before doing so, it’s worth noting that Lyons was USOC/USOPC board chair for four years — since the start of 2019 — and was never made an IOC member. This is telling.
Prediction, if not a rock-solid guarantee: Sykes will be made an IOC member sooner, probably much sooner, than later. This also will be telling. There are many backstage clues, but a front-facing one: hello, he was invited to this Summit.
7. The IOC “declaration” — the release — suggests that after an “open, frank and constructive” debate, the acting president of the Olympic Council of Asia, India’s Randhir Singh, threw out this idea: Mr. IOC President, we could have 2024 Olympic qualifiers for the Russians in Asia because, you know, a lot of Russia is in Asia, too, and no one in Asia is remotely as upset at Russia as the moralistic Europeans, except that’s not what he really said even though that’s what he really said. There’s a parallel here of sorts. Israel is geographically 100% in Asia but it competes in Europe for Olympic purposes because, you know, there may be some lingering animosity in the Arab world toward Israel, UN Resolution 242 from 1967 and all that. So if for 2023 and 2024, Russia can be slotted into Asia for qualifying purposes, whatevs. Singh didn’t really say that but pretty much, whatevs. Bach, according to this release, “thanked the OCA for its creative proposal.” The Summit unanimously agreed to “lead the further exploration of the OCA initiative concerning the participation of athletes who are” — and this next bit of language is very precise — “in full respect of the Olympic charter and the sanctions.”
Anyone who thinks that Randhir Singh, who truly is a very decent and intelligent guy, came up with this all by himself — please. He is the acting OCA president!
Singh was an IOC member from 2001 to 2014. He is now an honorary member. That means that for the past eight years, he has not been a major player.
Who in the OCA are the major players? There are two people. The sheik, Sheik Ahmad al-Fahad al-Sabah of Kuwait. Without getting into it, the sheik is self-suspended. That leaves Husain al-Musallam, also of Kuwait, the OCA director general. He is also president of the federation that used to be FINA and, over the weekend, rebranded itself as World Aquatics.
The clever choreography here almost surely involved al-Musallam and Bach, two world-class operators, who came up with, sure, a plan to talk about a concept leading to a pathway.
Which means it would appear to be all but a done deal. From now on, it’s just details. Albeit lots of them.
8. And then another bit of choreography.
As noted, Lyons is not an IOC member.
So on the way home from Lausanne, Lyons talked with Rachel Bachman of the Wall Street Journal. Which posted a story early Monday. And then, a few hours later, the USOPC held a news conference at which Lyons spoke again, saying that it supported the idea of including the Russians in Paris as long as they don’t compete under their flags or colors.
This marked an intriguing turn because, for most of 2022, the USOPC has been at severe odds with the IOC over most things Russian. Having the Americans on the IOC side — very helpful in Lausanne.
But also this — to have Lyons float this trial balloon cost Bach and the IOC nada, zip, nothing. If there is political blowback, who’s out the door? She is. At the end of the month.
9. So, over the next many weeks and months, will there be criticism? Undoubtedly.
About that criticism:
How much is fundamental hatred of Putin? How much is rooted in blatant racism? How much outright hypocrisy?
Let’s be brutally direct. The United States government estimates that 500,000 people have been killed in the conflict in Ethiopia over the past two years, the New York Times reported Monday. No one seems to be calling for Ethiopia to be banned. War is in its 12th year in Syria; estimates are half a million are dead there, too. Widespread calls for Syria’s ouster? When the Games were held in PyeongChang in the winter of 2018, the two Koreas were still technically at war.
This could go on and on. As Bach said, our world is rife with conflict.
Which outbreak of violence — which war — draws moralistic condemnation from Europe and western allies? And why?
Shortly after the Russian invasion of Ukraine began, it’s worth recalling BFM French TV’s Phillipe Corbé reported: “We’re not talking here about Syrians fleeing the bombing of the Syrian regime backed by Putin. We’re talking about Europeans leaving in cars that look like ours to save their lives.”
ITV’s Lucy Watson: “Now the unthinkable has happened to them, and this is not a developing, Third World nation. This is Europe.”
Daniel Hannan in the Telegraph, also from Britain: “They seem so like us. That is what makes it so shocking. Ukraine is a European country. Its people watch Netflix and have Instagram accounts, vote in free elections and read uncensored newspapers. War is no longer something visited upon impoverished and remote populations. It can happen to anyone.”
But when it does happen to “impoverished and remote populations” — the way it did when the United States invaded Iraq and Afghanistan — the double standard is ferocious. The United States spent 20 years in Afghanistan. How many thousands of lives did that cost? And for what?
Calls for the United States to be banned? None.
10. Still, this is the kind of pushback the IOC can expect. Amid that USOPC call Monday, a USA Today columnist asked if there had been “discussion” at the Summit about what she called the “ridiculous designation” the Russians had been allowed to compete under at recent editions of the Games, adding, “I’m thinking specifically of many, many, many of the gymnasts that have been seen either making signs of support, appearing at rallies, et cetera, et cetera.” She asked, “How would those athletes be dealt with?”
In March, at a World Cup event in Qatar, Russian gymnast Ivan Kuliak stood on the podium with a “Z” on his uniform. Subsequently, the international federation banned him for a year.
He said later, according to Russia Today, “I saw it with our military and looked at what this symbol means. It turned out [it means] ‘for victory’ and ‘for peace.’
“I didn’t wish anything bad on anyone. I just showed my position. As an athlete, I will always fight for victory and stand for peace.”
So, let’s compare.
At the 2020/1 Tokyo Olympics, the American shot putter Raven Saunders won silver. She is Black and gay. On the podium, she crossed her arms above her head to represent “the intersection of where all people who are oppressed meet.”
That’s OK, right? She ended up with no punishment.
At the 2016 Rio Olympics, the American Sam Kendricks won bronze in the pole vault. But he is perhaps even better known for a different moment during the competition. Then a second lieutenant in the U.S. Army, Kendricks was in the middle of an attempt when The Star Spangled Banner began to ring out around Olympic Stadium for another event. He stopped his run and stood at attention for the duration of the anthem and was widely hailed by the American media as a hero.
So — that’s OK, right? No one would ever doubt that Kendricks would always fight for victory and stand for peace. Truth, justice and the American way. Right?
11. This thing from the declaration about potentially including those Russians who are “in full respect of the Olympic charter and the sanctions” is a follow-up to Bach’s comments in September when he referred to having “athletes with a Russian passport who do not support the war back in competition.”
About this, he has been consistent. Then, he said, “To be clear, it is not about necessarily having Russia back. On the other hand — and here comes our dilemma — this war has not been started by Russian athletes.”
Some Russians have continued to compete in tennis and cycling without flags and anthems. So for them for 2024, probably no prob.
What to do with the likes of former heavyweight boxer Nikolai Valuev or soccer player Diniyar Bilyaletdinov, called up to military service?
Gold medalist swimmer Eugene Rylov appeared at a pro-war rally. That is per se disqualifying?
OK, but the American delegation in Tokyo included 14 U.S. Army soldiers, one Marine and one Coast Guardsman (the Americans sent three more Army soldiers for the Paralympics, including swim star Elizabeth Marks).
The U.S. Army specifically runs what it calls its World Class Athlete Program. Kendricks was among those sent to Tokyo; he did not compete because of Covid.
The USOPC website brags about that Marine, Staff Sgt. John Stefanowicz Jr., the first Marine to represent the United States in wrestling in 30 years at the Games (he finished 12th in his category), reprinting a Corps release that says Stefanowicz “exemplified the Warrior Ethos and Whole Marine Concept.”
People, these start to get to be mighty fine lines. An American is celebrated for exemplifying a “Warrior Ethos.” Staff Sgt. Stefanowicz, like every other Marine, has sworn to obey the orders of the president of the United States and the orders of superior Marine officers. A Russian gets drafted. He’s free to resist? Not likely. Yet he’s supposed to be — barred? The rationale is — what?
Details.
12. Now to Salt Lake.
If you listen closely, even to the USOPC, you can hear the positioning that it’s better for a Winter Games there in 2034, not 2030.
Salt Lake City, indeed, has everything a Winter Games host would need. The Games there were great in 2002 and the return is likely to be world-class again.
But it’s way more likely for 2034.
The United States will stage the FIFA men’s World Cup in 2026 and then the Summer Games in Los Angeles in 2028. It makes sense to try to follow that up, marketing-wise, in Salt Lake City in 2030 because — why? A Los Angeles organizing committee would, under what circumstances, want to share even one dollar with a Salt Lake committee because — why?
Remember, a Games in the United States is always privately funded. No government money.
Even more to the point, any 2030 SLC discussion ignores the central fact of Olympic finance. NBC’s current deal with the IOC, $7.75 billion, runs through 2032. Common sense: after Los Angeles, wouldn’t NBC like another Games in the United States, especially after a 2018-22 run through three Games in Asia, two shadowed by the pandemic? Now, look at it from the IOC perspective. Its new contract will start in 2034. From the view of Olympic House in Lausanne, doesn’t it make infinitely more sense to start off a banging new U.S. contract by having that first Games in 2034 in Salt Lake City?
Answer to that last question: yes, it does.