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The Russian political elite has long dreamed of finding a national idea capable of rallying the people. Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev tried to consolidate the country with his idea of socialism "with a human face." Former President Boris Yeltsin roused the people around anti-communism. Putin's motto is: "Russia is back!"
The U.S. plan to sell over $20 billion worth of weaponry to Arab allies, to counter Iran's ascendance, attempts to contain Iran and force it to spend money on an arms race instead of developing its economy, intimidating it into bankruptcy. One major flaw in this plan is its failure recognize that Iran's growing influence is not due to hard power but to its use of soft power and militias.
For decades NATO-related issues were a key focus of Russian foreign policy. After years of setbacks and stalled progress, the NATO-Russia relationship may have finally reached a turning point. Current developments indicate that despite major difficulties during the 1990s, icy relations are beginning to thaw.
The US and its European allies continue to insist that Kosovo cannot be held indefinitely in the protectorate limbo and must be given independence. Russia maintains that for the solution to be viable, it must rest on the consent of both parties to the conflict. It is difficult to see how a few more rounds of shuttle diplomacy between Belgrade and Pristina – and slightly heavier lobbying in both places – would break the current impasse. The situation does not bode well for Kosovo and Serbia, the Balkans more broadly and the ‘frozen conflicts' in Transdniestria, Abkhazia or South Ossetia.
There were smiles and sunshine and seacoast, but what exactly did the Bush-Putin summit succeed at, and fail at? RFE/RL correspondent Heather Maher asks James Collins -- the U.S. ambassador to Russia from 1997-2001, and now the director of the Russian and Eurasian program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington -- to tally the wins and losses.
here's a sea of rumors and theories raging about the Russian presidential succession and what Vladimir Putin would do after -- and if -- he stepped down. The diversity of theories is impressive, illustrating how unpredictable and potentially unstable the situation may become. The range of guesses made by pundits, Kremlin insiders, political analysts and experts at home and abroad is getting broader, not narrower, as the election draws nearer. Moreover, those who venture guesses don't seem to be basing them on even partial knowledge; rather, it's a desire by each to sound more interesting than the other guy.
A discussion with Rose Gottemoeller, Alexei Arbatov, and Dmitri Trenin about the future of U.S.-Russian relations.
2007 Carnegie International Nonproliferation Conference, which took place on Monday, June 25 – Tuesday 26, 2007 at the Ronald Reagan International Trade Center in Washington, D.C.
What we need is both vision - a scenario for a world free of nuclear weapons. And action - progressive steps to reduce warhead numbers and to limit the role of nuclear weapons in security policy. These two strands are separate but they are mutually reinforcing. Both are necessary, both at the moment too weak.
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