Volume 10 Numbers 2/3

Spring/Summer 2001

US-Russian Relations in a Changing World
Thomas E. Graham, Jr.

Note: This essay was written before President Bush met with President Putin in Ljubljana, Slovenia, on June 16. Although that meeting led to a considerable improvement in the tone of US-Russian relations, it did nothing to change the fundamental character of, or challenges to, those relations outlined in this essay.

It all seems so quaint now-the great hope for USRussian relations so widespread in Russia and the United States at the end of the Cold War. But less than a decade ago, shortly after the demise of the Soviet Union, Russian president Boris Yeltsin addressed an enthusiastic joint session of the American Congress, declaring that Russia "was extending its hand in friendship to the people of America" and inviting the United States to join Russia "in partnership in the quest for freedom and justice in the twenty-first century." The Clinton administration, which entered office less than a year later, was eager to reciprocate. President Clinton called for "a strategic alliance with Russian reform." The struggle to build a free society in Russia was "one of the great human dramas of our day," he argued. It presented the "greatest security challenge for our generation," and it offered "one of the greatest economic opportunities of our lifetime." To underscore the importance of Russia, Clinton made his first trip abroad-to Vancouver, Canada-to meet with Yeltsin to discuss ways in which the United States, and the West as a whole, could help.

That the euphoria would pass away eventually was inevitable. But few foresaw the sharp deterioration of the past three years that would leave US-Russian relations at the dawn of the twenty-first century, at one of their lowest points, if not the lowest, since the late Gorbachev period. Gratuitous anti-Americanism, once confined to the fringe, has become regular fare for the mainstream Russian press, while Russophobia is penetrating increasingly into American discourse on Russian developments. Russian leaders have been disturbed by what they see as excessively harsh or dismissive rhetoric coming out of the new Bush Administration, while American leaders have been shocked by language they find reminiscent of the Cold War coming from senior Russian officials. The appearances of then-Russian Security Council Secretary Sergey Ivanov and US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld at the Munich Conference on European Security Policy, in early February, neatly encapsulated each side's grievances. Ivanov reiterated the canard that NATO's use of depleted uranium weapons in Kosovo had led to an ecological catastrophe equivalent to Chernobyl. Rumsfeld, however, did not hear this. He left before Ivanov spoke, and he did not see fit to mention Russia in his own remarks.

Both sides, of course, profess to want to improve relations, and both sides have recently taken small steps to restore a more civil tone to their mutual discourse, as witness President Bush's unexpectedly warm words about Russia in his address on missile defense, on May 1, and Putin's encouraging response. Bush called for a "new cooperative relationship [that] should look to the future, not to the past" and ventured that "perhaps one day, we can even cooperate in a joint defense." Putin said he looked forward to more dialogue on this issue. These tentative steps toward halting the deterioration in relations are hardly surprising, for, despite the obvious problems, each side recognizes that it still stands to gain considerably-at least on security matters-from constructive relations. Such relations would facilitate stabilizing the Caspian region and the exploitation of potentially significant energy resources; reinforce the weakening stability of Central Asia and lessen the risk of great-power competition there; help manage China's rise as a major world power; ease concerns about the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and the means of delivering them; and abet the process of European integration. For Russia, such relations would also greatly advance the urgent task of rebuilding its economy.

Laying a firm foundation for improved relations is not going to be easy, however. The world has changed much over the past decade-and in ways that cut to the heart of US-Russian relations. Those changes, once understood, help illuminate the causes of the strain in these relations, as well as clarify our thinking on how to repair them. In this light, let me propose ten theses on US-Russian relations in a changing world.

1. Today's world is not the one we anticipated just a decade or so ago, and the United States has become the world's preeminent power by an unexpectedly wide margin.
In the mid-1980s, talk of America's decline was in vogue. Many observers were convinced that Japan would overtake the United States as an economic power in the not-too-distant future. There were widespread fears that the country was losing its technological edge. Even those who disputed that claim did not foresee the good fortune the United States would enjoy in the 1990s. Between 1990 and 1998, the US economy grew by 27 percent, the European Union's by 15 percent, and Japan's by 9 percent, while Russia's collapsed by about 40 percent. As a result, the United States exercises preponderant power in the world today. There is simply no country that can challenge the United States simultaneously across all dimensions of power and influence-military, economic, financial, technological, and cultural-and none looming on the horizon. With this surfeit of power, the United States' potential to shape the emerging international order is as great as it has ever been.

In the mid-1980s, few predicted the impending collapse of the Soviet Union. While the profound strains and stresses on the system were well known, the conventional wisdom-even as late as 1989-90-was that a reassertion of centralized, authoritarian rule was much more likely than radical breakdown. Similarly, few foresaw that during the last decade Russia would suffer a socioeconomic collapse unprecedented for a great power not defeated in a major war.

In Europe, the process of integration has proceeded much more rapidly than anyone had anticipated. NATO has already expanded, and further enlargement is on the agenda. The European Union is set to take in its first new members from Eastern Europe in the next few years. It has moved rapidly from being a mere trade organization to being a genuine economic, political, and security community. In Asia, few predicted Japan's decade of stagnation or India's rapid growth. There was, of course, much talk of China's emergence as a great power, but the speed has been exaggerated.

These unanticipated developments mark an extraordinary geopolitical shift, the consequences of which we are only beginning to grasp. In particular, Russia's weakness has profound implications for the future of a country that once had helped discipline the transatlantic community and could play a central role in managing China's rise.

2. The Cold War is over.
Some time in the past few years, the Cold War finally came to an end. To be sure, a decade ago, the collapse of the Soviet Empire, the breakup of the Soviet Union, and the demise of Soviet communism eliminated the fundamental building blocks of the Cold War international system. Those events accelerated the erosion of bipolarity and reshuffled the relative standing of the various dimensions of power. The economic dimension, which was truly multipolar with the United States, several European states, and Japan acting as centers of power, rose in importance, as the bipolar strategic nuclear one declined. Even the bipolarity of the strategic nuclear equation was attenuated as the US and Russian arsenals were reduced, and nuclear weapons capabilities proliferated.

As is the rule in history, however, perceptions lagged behind reality, and practice behind perceptions. While we talked of a post-Cold War era, we continued to operate within its conceptual framework. Russia remained the United States' top foreign policy priority well into President Clinton's second term, while Russia gave precedence to their relations with the United States throughout the Yeltsin presidency. In other words, well into 1990s, as during the Cold War, the United States and Russia viewed the world through the prism of their relations with one another. In both countries, there was a sense that the US-Russian relationship would play a decisive role in shaping the post-Cold War world. That view was predicated on the assumption that Russia would begin to recover from the multiple ills of its Soviet inheritance in short order, even if it was clear that full recovery was a matter of years or decades. That, of course, did not happen.

3. The end of the Cold War, geopolitical shifts, and globalization have changed the nature of power in the international system to Russia's disadvantage. The use of force may remain the ultimo ratio, but its relative importance has declined, as fewer goals can be best advanced through seizing and holding territory. Within the realm of force, the role of nuclear weapons has been radically altered. While possessing them continues to bring prestige, large arsenals are of little use other than for deterring other large arsenals or massive conventional attacks. At the same time, a small number of weapons could prove invaluable, if not to states per se, then to substate actors, such as terrorist organizations. In short, the fewer, the more usable.

As the role of force has declined, that of other factors-technology, finance, trade, cultural influence, and so on-has grown. In the absence of any plausible scenario leading to a war between great powers, the economy has become the primary arena of competition and economic prowess the main factor in determining a country's relative standing in the world.

Unfortunately for Russia, its standing in the world has historically been based on its military prowess, reinforced during the Cold War by its ideological appeal, which has since vanished. In economic terms, Russia has traditionally been a poor country, and the gap between it and the world's leading powers only widened during the last decade. In short, Russia has relatively little of what counts most in the world today.

4. Russia does not lie at the center of US foreign policy, nor can it.
As a result of these changes, Russia no longer enjoys the centrality for US interests it once did. While it remains an important country-by reason of its nuclear capability, location in the heart of Eurasia, veto in the UN Security Council, and rich resources-it must compete for the United States' attention with other leading countries and regions, including, notably, Europe, China, Japan, and India. Moreover, Russia's importance varies from issue to issue. It has, for example, a central role to play on proliferation, while its impact on the global economy is negligible.

In the United States, few disagree with according Russia a lower priority. The debate rages over where-below first place-to rank Russia and how intensely to engage it. There are four schools of thought: (1) the "forget Russia" school, which would not devote much time or energy to Russia in the belief that it simply does not matter that much any longer; (2) the "protocontainment" school, which believes, no matter what happens, Russia is bound to be a problem for the United States and therefore the United States' goal should be to limit the damage Russia can do to our interests; (3) the "selective engagement" school, which would engage only on issues of key interest to the United States, largely in the security realm; and (4) the "broad engagement" school, which advocates engagement over a wide range of issues in the belief that only such an approach can restore the levels of trust necessary for progress on those first-order security priorities.

5. The United States is no longer a "status quo" power. Throughout the Cold War it was commonplace to think of the United States as a power supporting the status quo while engaged in global competition with a revolutionary power, the Soviet Union, intent on changing the fundamental nature of the international system. While the United States has not become a revolutionary power, the collapse of the Soviet Union, the mounting wave of globalization, and technological breakthroughs on information, telecommunications, and biogenetics are revolutionizing the international system. In other words, there is no status quo to preserve. The challenge before the United States, as the leading beneficiary of these dramatic changes, is to use its period of peak power to channel them and shape the international order in ways that will perpetuate US preeminence and prosperity well into the future. This will require an overhaul of the UN system (particularly, the Security Council); new or reformed institutions to manage the global economy; new methods of dealing with transnational problems (crime, ecological disasters, epidemic diseases); and a new framework for strategic stability. (The treaty framework that has regulated US-Russian nuclear relations for the past 30 years is obsolete, if only because strategic stability-given the inevitable proliferation of weapons of mass destruction-is no longer simply a bilateral matter.)

6. Russia is a backward-looking power. This is true in two ways. First, acutely aware of its own weakness, Russia wants to delay the consolidation of a new international system until a time when it has greater capacity to shape it. It also seeks to slow down changes that would further erode its standing in the world. This is one reason for its adamant opposition to any form of national missile defense, no matter how limited, and its insistence on maintaining the treaty framework. Nuclear parity is its last remaining attribute of great-power status.

Second, Russian leaders continue to operate with a zero-sum, nineteenth-century geopolitical, or Cold War mindset, insisting that Russia is a major pole (even if they harbor deep doubts on that score). Putin has spent the last year seeking to create strategic partnerships capable of eroding America's preponderance or to divide Europe from the United States. While he has underscored the need to rebuild Russia's economy, he has moved aggressively to sell Russian weaponry abroad, in part because this helps maintain Russia's military capabilities. In this context, trade is a handmaiden of security concerns.

7. Russia acts as if the United States views the world through the prism of its relations with Russia.
The Russian elites have yet to reconcile themselves to the fact that much of US policy treats Russia, at best, as a secondary consideration. This is true even of the security realm, where Russia counts most in the world. Russian leaders insist that missile defense is directed against them. The reality is that the United States' first concern is rogue states-North Korea, Iran, and Iraq- with accidental launches from Russia (resulting from the deterioration of Russian command and control systems) a lesser concern. NATO enlargement is focused, first of all, on promoting democratic development in Eastern Europe, bolstering security, and maintaining the United States' position in Europe; it is not directed against Russia. Multiple pipeline routes from the Caspian are primarily about energy security; they are not aimed at undermining Russia's presence in the region.

8. There is a gaping and growing asymmetry between Russia and the United States in power, fortune, attitude, and perceptions.
As a result of the developments of the past decade, American and Russian elites live in radically different worlds, and they are intent on building radically different ones over the next decade and beyond. The United States is the world's predominant power; it exudes optimism and self-confidence as it looks toward the future; it revels in being indispensable to world developments; and it believes itself called to lead in the world. Russia, on the other hand, is a state in decline; it is mired in self-doubt and an identity crisis; it fears it is being marginalized; and yet it aspires to be a world leader. This asymmetry precludes a wideranging, substantive relationship of equals, corrupts communication, and fuels suspicions.

9. Russia matters to the United States more because of its weakness than because of its strength.
This is, perhaps, the most radical change of the past generation. A generation ago, the United States was worried about the great military capabilities of the Soviet Union wedded to hostile intentions. Now it is more concerned by the risk of "loose nukes," by the deterioration in Russia's capacity to ensure the safety and security of weapons of mass destruction, and the proliferation problems that this lessened capacity creates. A generation ago, the United States worried about Soviet aggression in Europe and the Middle East. Now it is far more concerned that instability and a breakdown in governance in Russia could spill over and destabilize its neighbors, many of which are fragile states themselves. A generation ago, the United States worried that the Soviet Union's veto in the Security Council undermined the effectiveness of the United Nations. Now it is-or at least should be-concerned that Russia's weakness, coupled with growing resentment of the United States, has increasingly tempted it to circumvent the Security Council in pursuit of its goals. A generation ago, the United States worried about the implications of the Soviet Union's economic potential for its military might. Now it is more concerned that Russia's decline could reach levels that would transform Russia into an object of competition among more-advanced economic powers.

10. Improving US-Russian relations requires an approach that is less ambitious and more practical than that of the last decade.
The Clinton administration came to office with grand plans for Russia and US-Russian relations. The goal was nothing less than a massive transformation of Russia-as Deputy Secretary Strobe Talbott put it- into "a normal, modern state-democratic in its governance, abiding by its own constitution and by its own laws, market-oriented and prosperous in its economic development, at peace with itself and with the rest of the world." The administration spoke boldly of a strategic partnership with Russia. By the time it left office, its policies lay in ruins, and that failure, coupled with socioeconomic depression in Russia, fueled the deterioration in relations we have witnessed over the past two to three years.

The first step in improving relations is to restore the trust that has suffered so greatly. And doing that requires a more focused agenda. The United States needs to take into account Russia's diminished capacity to engage and to avoid overwhelming the relationship with secondary and tertiary issues. Rather, the two countries need to concentrate on those issues where Russia truly matters and where there is some hope of success. That is critical to generating and sustaining the public support needed for improved relations.

Given these realities and perceptions, how do the two countries go about repairing relations and putting them on a durable basis? The starting point should be a new vision of what US-Russian relations could be over the long run, something to replace the illusory, disingenuous partnership of the 1990s and the very real rivalry of the Cold War. The two countries could then work back from that vision to the steps both countries should be taking now to turn that vision into a reality.

Coming up with this vision will require hard, honest thinking about how the world has changed and will continue to change. It will require each country to articulate as clearly as possible its own interests and priorities. Disagreements are inevitable-as they are between any two countries-but there should be a sufficient number of common goals and problems for a broad constructive relationship. At a minimum, there are numerous issues the two countries should be discussing now, including strategic stability and nonproliferation, East Asia, Central and South Asia, the Caspian region, European integration, space, and global health and environment.

Some preliminary thoughts on a few issues
East Asia. China is destined to have an historic impact on the geopolitics and geoeconomics of the region. It is difficult to determine which of the two scenarios that frame that country's future presents more of a challenge: its continued emergence as a major world power or its destabilization as its economic dynamism comes into increasing conflict with current political constraints. But one thing is clear: constructing a durable balance will be more complicated if Russia's presence in Asia wanes further. In this sense, the United States, as well as most Asian powers, has a long-term strategic interest in the development and maintenance of a healthy Russian presence in East Asia.

In this regard, it is worth highlighting a little discussed, but deeply worrisome possibility. The very market-oriented reform the West is advocating for Russia could accelerate Russia's withdrawal from its Far Eastern regions. Much of the industry in that region was located there for strategic and administrative reasons, not because it made sense from the standpoint of market economics. Consequently, genuine market reform will tend to encourage population movement out of the region and reorient the local economy toward China, Japan, and South Korea. Such developments will only attenuate Moscow's hold over its Far East. If this is indeed true, and given US interests in the region, it would make sense for our two countries, along with other interested parties, to examine how they can rebuild the economy in the Russian Far East so as to bolster Russian sovereignty there.

Central Asia. Russia has vital interests in the region. The region acts as a buffer against threats emanating from South Asia, such as the Taliban movement in Afghanistan. Moreover, the fortified borders of the former Soviet Union are the first line of defense for Russia, especially because it does not have sufficient resources to monitor effectively its long border with Kazakhstan. Finally, Moscow has to be deeply concerned about the tenuous status of ethnic Russians in the region, especially in northern Kazakhstan. Infringements of their rights or instability could lead to refugee flows that would strain Russia's already overstressed social-welfare system.

The United States' interests in the region are less than vital. The primary interest is access to the region's energy resources and prevention of widespread instability in a region that borders on four nuclear powers. A major Russian presence in the region is not incompatible with these interests, nor are close political and economic relations between Russia and the states of the region, as long as the United States' access remains assured. Indeed, the United States has an interest in the ability of Russia, along with other powers, to act as a stabilizing force in the region. Given the balance of forces in the region, Russia will have to play a leading role in any regional security arrangement that is developed over the next decade. At the same time, the United States believes strongly that the emergence of strong, prosperous independent states in Central Asia will work to Russia's own long-term advantage.

Even though their interests are complementary, Washington and Moscow have yet to engage in an extended, serious dialogue about Central Asia. Given the balance of interests, there should be a way in which the United States and Russia can cooperate to enhance regional security, bolster the independence of the Central Asian states, and improve their access to foreign markets. The United States and Russia could also expand their cooperative efforts in dealing with terrorists groups based in Afghanistan to help stabilize both Central Asia and other regions, such as the Caucasus and the Middle East.

Missile defense. President Bush laid out his administration's initial thinking on this matter in an address on May 1, stressing what will be one of his administration's leitmotivs: the world has changed dramatically since the end of the Cold War. The United States and Russia are no longer strategic adversaries, and, for that reason, the United States is no longer deeply concerned about a Russian nuclear attack (although it remains concerned about accidental launches). What does worry the United States is the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and the means of delivering them.

The starting point for any discussion of missile defenses has to be that a real threat of WMD-armed ballistic-missile attack could emerge sometime over the next decade. The United States and Russia can debate the exact timing and the possible countries or organizations, but, given the proliferation of WMD and ballistic-missile technologies, the threat is undeniable. There are various ways to deal with this threat, including diplomacy, better export control measures, and other counterproliferation programs; but ways of coping will also include active defense. Moreover, given the long lead time needed to develop new weapons systems, the time to start thinking about them has long since arrived.

There are a number of points Russia needs to understand about the Bush administration's approach to missile defense. First, it is a long way from the deployment of any system. It has still not decided on the exact architecture, let alone demonstrated the effectiveness of the necessary technology. Second, it wants to build a more robust system than the Clinton administration was considering, but one that could be used to defend not only US territory but also that of our allies, as well as US installations and forces abroad. In other words, it is seeking more than just a national missile-defense system. Tellingly, administration officials no longer talk of national missile defense, but simply of missile defense. Third, it is prepared to consider cooperation with Russia and other countries in the development and deployment of at least parts of this system. Fourth, this administration will move forward on missile defense, unilaterally if necessary, although it firmly believes that it will ultimately do so with the approval and support of our allies in Europe and East Asia. It would like to do so with Russia's support.

In this regard, it is worth considering that, while Russia probably lacks the ability to prevent the deployment of some system, it does have the wherewithal to shape whatever system is deployed in ways that advance its own interests and security. At a minimum, it should consider a cooperative effort with the United States, one that would wed US, Russian, and European technology in the deployment of an effective, if limited, system. Such an approach could eventually bring substantial Western investment in Russian high tech. It would also create the powerful symbol of the United States and Russia actively cooperating in the concrete defense of each other's territory.

European security. In the historical sense, the issue of security on the European continent, outside the former Soviet Union, has been solved. While unrest- and armed violence-will continue to erupt in Southeast Europe, there is no plausible scenario that would lead to a violent confrontation between major European powers or a European-wide conflagration. The process of European integration will continue. Over the next decade, the Baltic states and most other European states outside the former Soviet Union will be integrated into the European Union and NATO.

The question to address, now, is how to manage relations among the three key components of the European equation: the United States, a united Europe, and Russia. Each will have a vital interest in the stability and the prosperity of the other two. Europe should serve as a major trading partner for both the United States and Russia. Russia, if it gets its political and legal framework right, would be an attractive place for investment by European and American firms. Security concerns would shift from regions within Europe to neighboring zones, such as North Africa, the Middle East, the Caucasus, and the Persian Gulf. The challenge would be for the United States, Europe, and Russia to cooperate in achieving their common security goals in these regions. At the same time, the United States and Russia could deepen their cooperation in meeting common security challenges in East Asia, as discussed above.

What will become of NATO under such circumstances is difficult to say, although clearly it will be quite different from today's NATO, if only because the European pillar will be more cohesive, coherent, and capable. If Russia remains outside NATO, as is likely, then there will be the need for some cooperative superstructure that includes Russia. Beyond these traditional security issues, there is a wealth of other matters on which the United States and Russia can cooperate: space exploration, energy development, the environment, public health (including working toward a cure for HIV/AIDS), to name a few. Both countries have considerable scientific and technological talent to apply in these areas. But cooperation will not be strictly bilateral, since these are issues that affect the world as a whole. Nevertheless, the benefits of such cooperation for both the United States and Russia are obvious.

Whether the United States and Russia move toward constructive engagement over the next decade and beyond depends on what happens in each country. It is not merely a question of will but of concrete developments that will determine whether each country faces the outside world confident of its abilities to advance and defend its own interests. In this regard, economic developments are critical. Continued economic well-being in the United States and a sustained Russian recovery-particularly one that closed the gap with the world's leading powers, however slowly-would certainly facilitate such a development. Neither, of course, is inevitable.

The recent economic worries in the United States indicate that the "new economy" has not changed the fundamental way in which economies function. There are serious problems, some on the agenda already, some looming on the horizon, including reform of the social security system, providing for energy needs, building and maintaining a cutting-edge educational system, and so on. Continued American prosperity is hardly guaranteed. The government, and society as a whole, will be challenged to find the correct policies to bolster the country's well-being.

Russia faces a much graver socioeconomic challenge after the sharp decline of the 1990s. History should offer some comfort: Russia has repeatedly rebuilt itself after periods of decline and disorder- contrary to the predictions of many outsiders-and regained its standing in the world. There is certainly no reason to assume a priori that Russia cannot turn the current economic recovery into a sustained revival. That said, there is also nothing inevitable about Russia's recovery, contrary to what some Russian commentators imply. History is replete with Great Powers that have gone into irreversible decline; one only has to think of the Ottoman and Austro- Hungarian empires of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Whether Russia repeats its own historical pattern of decline and recovery or shares the experience of the Ottoman Empire will depend on the choices the Russian government and people make.

That last point, of course, is a truism. But it is also an uncomfortable truth for the outside world, particularly for the United States, for it underscores a profound asymmetry between its interests and its means. The United States has a huge interest in Russia's recovery as a healthy, democratic world power but few means by which to advance that outcome. More worrisome, the lesson of the 1990s is that the United States has greater potential to do harm than good by intervening directly in Russia's domestic transformation. Nevertheless, many Americans believe that the United States can assist Russia's recovery indirectly, by encouraging and facilitating its entry into the World Trade Organization or by helping to fashion a relatively benign international order in which Russia would have the time to focus on its multiple domestic ills. Similarly, many Americans believe the United States should remain prepared to respond to Russian initiatives and requests for cooperation in rebuilding the Russian economy and political system, as long as those initiatives and requests make sense. But, in the end, the United States is left hoping that Russia will make the right choices-just as Russia is left hoping that the United States will use its preponderant power wisely.

Thomas E. Graham, Jr., is senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

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