U.S., Russia: Experienced Opponents
The paradox of U.S.-Russia relations is that just a cataclysm like September 11 can radically improve these relations, because cataclysms change the foreign policy priorities system for a while. However, as soon as a cataclysm’s impact is over, everything turns full circle, and the parties transform from partners into opponents. Yet, it does not necessarily mean they will turn from opponents into enemies.
Short-term U.S.-Russia partnership within the framework of anti-terrorism coalition lifted some acute problems in the bilateral relations. For instance, it became out of fashion in the U.S. to support Chechen separatists, who accompanied their acts by same slogans as Al-Qaeda terrorists. For a while, the U.S. no longer viewed Vladimir Putin as a former KGB officer, but began considering him an ally in the struggle against evil forces. Let us recall a small episode of Rudolph Giuliani’s memoirs: a procession of foreign guests expressing condolences to the New York mayor, and Putin among them, saying that a similar tragedy could have happened in Russia.
Yet, emotions is one thing, and interests is another. Already by 2003, it became clear that the anti-terrorism coalition as the U.S. saw it was coming to its end: the Kremlin refused to place Saddam Hussein on the same shelf with Osama bin Laden. Besides, it became fully displayed that the two countries have a limited margin for compromise. Despite the thaw in the U.S.-Russia relations, that factor could not affect the process of NATO’s eastward expansion by means of accepting the Baltic states into the alliance (a corresponding decision had been made earlier). So, maintaining positive relations with Moscow was a smaller priority for the U.S. than developing the missile defense system despite Russia’s negative reaction.
Moreover, there still exists competition on the post-Soviet space. That competition only intensified in the recent years. In the 1990s, the U.S. did not have real opportunities for ‘big playing’ on the CIS territory. Now, however, CIS countries have brought up pro-West political elite, which drastically changed the entire situation. When the U.S. faces a dilemma between following its own long-term priorities, and making concessions to Moscow, it is clear what choice it makes. By the way, that course has bipartisan support in the U.S., and it is in vain to expect it to change radically after the upcoming presidential election. While it was fashionable in Russia, during the anti-terrorism coalition epoch, to divide the U.S. establishment into ‘bad’ democrats and ‘good’ republicans, the reverse classification looks naive as well.
However, there is no need to sound the alarm. Russia and the U.S. have a long-term experience of opposing each other. That opposition has always had its verge, and the parties were wise enough not to cross it, even in the worst times (like during the detente’s downfall in the early 1980s). The verge still exists now. However, it is quite different (positively, of course) from that in the Cold War period, when geopolitical differences were supplemented by ideological counteraction.
Alexei Makarkin, deputy director general of the Political Technologies Center
All the Article in Russian as of Oct. 10, 2007
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