Garry Kasparov, writing for Newsweek International, calls President Putin out on the misnomer that he is a true ally of the West in the war on terror, and even less so committed to building a democratic society. And he really nails it.

The embattled George W. Bush isn’t going to pick a fight with Mr. Putin on matters of democracy and economy when these days everything is secondary to the war on terror. Here we come to the most dangerous delusion of all????????that a strongman in the Kremlin is good for security and necessary for stability. What started as a separatist war in Chechnya has been transformed by the Kremlin’s hard-line tactics into an increasingly radicalized jihad that now spans the entire North Caucasus. In addition to living with poverty and military abuses, locals find that the legal avenues for opposition have entirely disappeared. For the first time in more than 150 years, visitors to the region hear the ominous slogan of the 19th-century Caucasian resistance: “The Russians are stronger than us, but Allah is stronger than the Russians.”

It’s hard to imagine a more potent recipe for fomenting radicalism than the one cooked up by the Putin regime. Every citizen in the region is treated as a potential terrorist, and the few Russian soldiers brought up on charges of abuse are quickly freed by the courts. When the law of the land is blatantly corrupt, the rule of Sharia with the Qur’an in one hand and a gun in the other begins to look tempting. The blood-revenge tradition of the region and Islam are an explosive mix.

Nor is Russia an ally on terror outside its borders. Nuclear and missile technology flow to Iran, and Syria’s dictatorship is shielded from U.N. investigation of its terror activities, all while the Kremlin says it is trying to help by exploiting its “special relationship” with these rogue states.

What’s overlooked or ignored is how well this situation suits Putin and his clique. They have a vested interest in sowing instability at home and abroad in order to reap higher oil prices and justify an oppressive level of security, the two things they require to stay in power. This is policy, not negligence or mere obstructionism. With a Potemkin economy and dwindling liberties, force will eventually be required to repress an increasingly restive Russian populace????????difficult to justify in a “stable environment,” hence the need for enemies.

The U.S. president and European leaders may quarrel, but there is little doubt they share a belief in the sanctity of human life. In Russia today the state is matching the terrorists blow for blow, dragging us down to the lowest denominator of morality. Incendiary grenades and tanks were used against terrorists and child hostages alike in Beslan, and the investigation remains blocked. Military poison gas killed 130 hostages in the 2002 Nord-Ost theater siege, and the hundreds of survivors cannot get effective treatment for the side effects because the government refuses to release the composition of the toxin they inhaled.

Allies must have common goals and values. Putin’s Russia shares neither with the West today. It is time that the leaders of the free world stopped pretending otherwise.

While Kasparov has an increasingly large international following due to both his fame as a chess champion and his personal championing of democratic values, his popularity at home in Russia isn’t so high. The last I know about him is that he plans on running and winning in the State Duma elections, I would guess in order to secure a better platform to criticize the current government, prepare for a possible presidential run, but most of all secure the immunity that comes with a Duma seat.