Source: Kommersant
Today Presidents Vladimir Putin and George Bush will hold a short meeting in Moscow on the eve of the official APEC summit in Hanoi. The meetings between the presidents of Russia and the United States have long since ceased to hold any fateful significance, and that is good. What is bad is that they have become unproductive. The encounter between Putin and Bush in Hanoi has the potential to be an exception if a decision regarding Russia's accession to the WTO can be made there.
The List of Insults
However, consent from the White House is insufficient. Everyone knows that the discussion of the WTO and of the ill-starred Jackson-Vanick amendment in Congress is not focused exclusively on the trade and economic sides of the question. Next spring, Capitol Hill will see a full-scale referendum on Russia – on its domestic and foreign policies, economics, and "state of mind." It is entirely possible that Congress will refuse to support a bilateral protocol that would open the path of WTO accession for Russia.
Meanwhile, the relationship between the two countries is continuing to deteriorate. The atmosphere between the two is worse than at any point since 1991. This is worrisome and potentially dangerous, considering, for example, the possibility of renewed war in the Caucasus, which could eventually entangle Russia. Despite his irritation at Washington's actions, it appears that President Putin would like to halt or at least brake the downward slide in relations between Russia and the United States. The question is how that can be done.
The recent presentation in America of the "account of insults suffered by Russia" came off badly. No one here in Russia will admit that the "tally" in the dissolving partnership has been tilted exclusively in America's favor: either Russia has received nothing from its growing closeness with the US in the wake of 9/11 or all of the concessions that Russia has made were voluntary and entirely unselfish. For example, in helping America in Afghanistan, Russia acted chiefly in its own interests.
Still worse was the attempt to manipulate the United States with threats to "go East." Such hints are taken here in the US as blackmail, and in response the US does not prepare to make concessions but rather to take countermeasures if the situation really does change. It should be kept in mind that Chinese-American relations are evolving rapidly, and they are already significantly more lucrative than the relations between Russia and America and even than those between Russia and China.
Strategic Errors
The attempt to return to the idea of geopolitical exchanges so beloved in Moscow also has little to offer in the way of a future. The problem here is a lack of understanding of the difference between tactics and strategy. On the tactical level, diplomatic horse trading is appropriate and unavoidable, as the recent UN resolutions on North Korea and Georgia have shown. But to count on the United States being willing to "concede" Iran, Ukraine, or Georgia (again) to Russia for some previously-agreed upon price is simultaneously naive and cynical.
Here, incidentally, is the fundamental reason for the crumbling of the "strategic partnership" that dates from 2001-2002. At that time, the Kremlin made a series of steps towards the White House while simultaneously proffering a list of requests. The list basically boiled down to a single main point: a demand to give Russia a "free hand" in the countries of the CIS. Not only did the Americans not bite, but in 2003 they began to pursue a more active policy in the post-Soviet sphere. In that same year, Russian politics underwent a drastic shift in focus: from searching for a model of integration with the West to building its own center of power in Eurasia. With that, in the eyes of the Russian leadership, the US went from being a potential partner to being a true rival.
The irony is that the Kremlin has stubbornly sought from the White House something that the United States is not in a position to give to Russia. The difference between the 19th century and the 21st has been, in particular, that small and middling countries are no longer merely the pawns of the great powers. Instead, to a significant degree they are independent players in their own right: it is now Kyiv and Tashkent that decide, not Moscow and Washington. The problem for the Kremlin is that it has espoused the maxim "might makes right." But on its "new frontier," Russia can be successful only to the degree that the enticements it offers are attractive.
What is to be Done?
What indeed is to be done? For a start, admit the obvious: good relations with the US are advantageous for Russia, while bad relations between the two are not beneficial for anyone and may even be dangerous. Incidentally, China and India – Russia's fellows in the BRIC group of nations – understand that perfectly. Russia needs good relations with the US not because they are pleasant, but because without them it will be extremely difficult or perhaps even impossible to resolve any of the three most pressing strategic issues facing the country in the first half of the new century: comprehensive modernization, global integration, and national security.
Building relations with the United States is a serious and difficult business. Russia, like the USSR in its day, is accustomed to dealing almost exclusively with the administration in the White House and with the State Department. Nowadays that is not sufficient: effective contact with the legislative branch is also necessary. When China held talks on WTO accession, the Chinese literally besieged Congress and its individual members with attention. In contrast, Russian senators and Duma deputies wait for delegations to be exchanged instead of thinking up ways to organize a constant and soft-footed presence in Washington.
This focus on parity is harmful, since a clear asymmetry exists. Russians must learn how to lobby for their interests in America in an effective and civilized manner. A contract with a single PR firm, no matter how large, is not enough – a system is needed. It is also necessary to admit that reviving the system of state-sponsored foreign policy propaganda that is so fundamentally Soviet is a costly mistake.
Russia's image in the United States, as an American congressman put it, is not even on the level of failure – it languishing somewhere deep in the salt mines. Representations of the country abroad depend in large measure on interpretations of its government's policies, but the country is much more than the policies of its leadership. The transformation of the Russian embassy in the United States into an embassy of Russian culture – though not along the lines of a Soviet cultural center – could give Russia enormous resources for building a stable relationship with the US. And Russian and American companies who are striving towards each other in the market could think about how to unite their efforts on the national level in order to successfully advance their interests and influence the political and social milieus in which they work and earn a living.
No matter what, the spring of 2007 promises to be yet another test of Russian-American relations. There can be no concessions. For Moscow, it makes sense to honestly analyze past mistakes and to draw conclusions from them. And then, instead of a primitive laundry lists of geopolitical exchanges, it might come up with a coherent strategy. It is not necessary for Russia to refer to the US only to justify its own lack of readiness to make changes. The wonderful thing about the current moment is that, unlike during the time of the Cold War, no one absolutely has to tango. Everyone, if they want to and are able to, is dancing alone.
Dmitri Trenin, Moscow Carnegie Center