Losing Russia

The Costs of Renewed Confrontation

Dimitri K. Simes

From Foreign Affairs, November/December 2007

Summary:  U.S.-Russian relations are deteriorating rapidly. Misguided and arrogant U.S. policies since the end of the Cold War have fueled resentment in Russia, and Vladimir Putin's increasing defiance is inflaming the West. But Washington and Moscow need not be adversaries. Both sides must act soon to avert renewed confrontation.

DIMITRI K. SIMES is President of the Nixon Center and Publisher of The National Interest.

In fact, the Bush administration and influential politicians in both parties have routinely supported Saakashvili against Russia, notwithstanding his transgressions. The United States has urged him on several occasions to control his temper and avoid provoking open military confrontation with Russia, but it is clear that Washington has adopted Georgia as its main client in the region. The United States has provided equipment and training to the Georgian military, enabling Saakashvili to take a harder line toward Russia; Georgian forces have gone so far as to detain and publicly humiliate Russian military personnel deployed as peacekeepers in South Ossetia and Georgia proper.

Of course, Russia's conduct vis-à-vis Georgia has been far from exemplary. Moscow has granted Russian citizenship to most residents of Abkhazia and South Ossetia and has imposed economic sanctions against Georgia, often on dubious grounds. And Russian peacekeepers in the area are clearly there to limit Georgia's ability to rule the two regions. But this blind U.S. support for Saakashvili contributes to a sense in Moscow that the United States is pursuing policies aimed at undermining what remains of Russia's drastically reduced regional influence. The sense in the Kremlin is that the United States cares about using democracy as an instrument to embarrass and isolate Putin more than it cares about democracy itself.

DEALING WITH A RESURGENT RUSSIA

Despite these growing tensions, Russia has not yet become a U.S. adversary. There is still a chance to stop further deterioration of the relationship. This will require a clearheaded evaluation of U.S. objectives in the region and an examination of the many areas where U.S. and Russian interests converge -- especially counterterrorism and nonproliferation. It will also require careful management of situations such as the nuclear standoff in Iran, where the two countries' goals are similar but their tactical preferences diverge. Most important, the United States must recognize that it no longer enjoys unlimited leverage over Russia. Today, Washington simply cannot force its will on Moscow as it did in the 1990s.

The Bush administration and key congressional voices have reasonably suggested that counterterrorism and nonproliferation should be the defining issues in the U.S.-Russian relationship. Stability in Russia -- still home to thousands of nuclear weapons -- and the post-Soviet states is also a key priority. Moscow's support for sanctions -- and, when necessary, the use of force -- against rogue states and terrorist groups would be extremely helpful to Washington.

The United States has an interest in spreading democratic governance throughout the region, but it would be far-fetched to expect the Putin government to support U.S. democracy-promotion efforts. Washington must continue to ensure than no one, including Moscow, interferes with the rights of others to choose a democratic form of government or make independent foreign policy decisions. But it must recognize that it has limited leverage at its disposal to achieve this goal. With high energy prices, sound fiscal policies, and tamed oligarchs, the Putin regime no longer needs international loans or economic assistance and has no trouble attracting major foreign investment despite growing tension with Western governments. Within Russia, relative stability, prosperity, and a new sense of dignity have tempered popular disillusionment with growing state control and the heavy-handed manipulation of the political process.

The overwhelmingly negative public image of the United States and its Western allies -- carefully sustained by the Russian government -- sharply limits the United States' ability to develop a constituency inclined to accept its advice on Russia's domestic affairs. In the current climate, Washington cannot hope to do much more than convey strongly to Russia that repression is incompatible with long-term partnership with the United States. To make matters worse, the power of the United States' moral example has been damaged. Moreover, suspicion of U.S. intentions runs so deep that Moscow reflexively views even decisions not directed against Russia, such as the deployment of antimissile systems in the Czech Republic and Poland, with extreme apprehension.

Meanwhile, as Moscow looks westward with suspicion, Russia's use of its energy for political purposes has angered Western governments, not to mention its energy-dependent neighbors. Russia clearly sets different energy prices for its friends; government officials and executives of the state-controlled oil company Gazprom have occasionally displayed both bravado and satisfaction in threatening to penalize those who resist, such as Georgia and Ukraine. But on a fundamental level, Russia is simply rewarding those who enter into special political and economic arrangements with it by offering them below-market prices for Russian energy resources. Russia grudgingly accepts the Atlanticist choices of its neighbors but refuses to subsidize them. Also, it is somewhat disingenuous for the United States to respond to Russia's political use of energy with self-righteous indignation considering that no country introduces economic sanctions more frequently or enthusiastically than the United States.

U.S. commentators often accuse Russia of intransigence on Kosovo, but Moscow's public position is that it will accept any agreement negotiated by Serbia and Kosovo. There is no evidence that Russia has discouraged Serbia from reaching a deal with Kosovo; on the contrary, there have even been some hints that Moscow may abstain from voting on a UN Security Council resolution recognizing Kosovo's independence in the absence of a settlement with Belgrade. If unrecognized territories from the former Soviet Union, especially Abkhazia and South Ossetia, could likewise become independent without the consent of the states from which they seek to break away, Moscow would benefit. Many in Russia would not mind Kosovo's becoming a precedent for unrecognized post-Soviet territories, most of which are eager for independence leading to integration with Russia.

A variety of other foreign policy disagreements have exacerbated tensions further. It is true that Russia did not support the United States' decision to invade Iraq, but nor did key NATO allies such as France and Germany. Russia has supplied conventional weapons to some nations the United States considers hostile, such as Iran, Syria, and Venezuela, but it does so on a commercial basis and within the limits of international law. The United States may understandably view this as provocative, but many Russians would express similar feelings about U.S. arms transfers to Georgia. And although Russia has not gone as far as the United States and Europe would like when it comes to disciplining Iran and North Korea, Moscow has gradually come to support sanctions against both countries.