Barack Obama’s victory came at a difficult time in global history. He refused to clearly formulate his attitude to Russia during the election campaign, but there is hope that both young leaders will find a common language.
Everyone in Russia seemed to be watching the progress of the presidential campaign in the United States, because a change of president in the US always changes USRussian relations.
The United States and Russia are the world’s largest nuclear powers, and so the change of president in the US will influence not only the two countries’ future, but also the whole of mankind.
Russia’s relations with the new US administration will also influence its ties with the G7, the European Union and APEC.
Although the US became the world’s only superpower after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, which turned the world into a unipolar system, Russia has preserved its prestige in the larger part of the post-Soviet territory and the world as a whole. Russia has vast mineral resources without which a global economy is unthinkable in this globalising world.
Barack Obama’s victory came at a difficult time in global history. He defeated Republican candidate John McCain when the financial crisis was shaking the foundations of US economic might and the national currency. The dollar has been used as the global unit of account since the 1944 Bretton Woods agreement, with the IMF and the World Bank as its core institutions.
Obama has inherited from the Bush administration all of its foreign policy failures, including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, balancing at the edge of a war with Iran, and conflicts with Syria, Pakistan and North Korea. They have become a big headache and a source of tragedy for thousands of American families that have lost sons and husbands.
During his election campaign, Obama sharply criticised these Republican policies and promised to withdraw the US troops from Iraq within two or three years. He did not often speak about Russia during his televised debates with McCain, although his attitude to Russia does not differ much from that of the Republican candidate.
Obama and McCain, taking part in a presidential debate, were asked the barbed question “Do you think that Russia under Vladimir Putin is an evil empire?” and were asked to reply “yes” or “no.” “I think they've engaged in an evil behaviour and I think that it is important that we understand they're not the old Soviet Union but they still have nationalist impulses that I think are very dangerous,” Obama said.
“Maybe,”McCain said, adding: “If I say yes, then thatmeans that we're reigniting the old ColdWar. If I say no, it ignores their behaviour.” Obama is also being pressured by his advisers Madeleine Albright, former Secretary of State, and Cold War ideologist Zbigniew Brzezinski. He refused to clearly formulate his attitude to Russia during the election campaign, but he will have to do it now.
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has simplified the task for him. Unlike his predecessors, who used to wait until Washington officially announced the new president’s attitude to Russia,Medvedev clearly said in his first state-of-the-nation address what Obama should expect from Russia.He said: “It is not a secret that many countries still look at relations between Russia and the United States for steerage. It is true that this is not the simplest period in our relations, and we have many questions [to the US], including some of a moral nature. But we have no problems with the American nation, we have no inbred anti-Americanism.We hope our partners, the new United States administration, will make a choice in favour of full-fledged relations with Russia.” So, what relations will the Kremlin seek to develop with the new US administration? It proceeds from Medvedev’s address that President Bush’s “eastern policy” in the past few years, notably the development of a global ABM system, surrounding Russia with military bases, and the expansion of NATO, led the Russian authorities to believe that Russia was being tested for strength.
The first Russian reaction that shocked the West was Vladimir Putin’s speech at the Munich security conference in February 2007. The second surprise was President Medvedev’s decision to deploy Russian troops in South Ossetia in response to the Georgian invasion of that selfproclaimed Caucasian republic.
The Kremlin said the Georgian-Ossetian conflict “marked the evolution of a fundamentally new geopolitical situation.” This means that Russia has the ability to uphold its interests without looking in the direction of Washington. After years of decline, the Russian army has restored its combat capability, is receiving more novel weapons and changing its structure and form. From now on, Russia intends to adequately react to any threat to its security. Medvedev has also announced the measures he has approved in response to the deployment of the US ballistic missile system in Poland and the Czech Republic. He has stopped the liquidation of the remaining three missile regiments of the Kozelsk missile division, which was to be finished by 2010.
The division itself will be restored to its former strength, and modern Iskander missile systems will be deployed in Russia’s westernmost Kaliningrad Region to neutralise the US ABM system in Europe. Radars will be used to counter ABM systems.
However, Russia does not intend to resume the arms race or reignite confrontation with the United States or other NATO countries. There will not be another Cold War, contrary to what the West predicts, although Russia is taking adequate measures to protect itself from external threats.
Moreover, the Kremlin is energetically advocating the establishment of a new global security architecture.
The first Russian reaction that shocked the West was Vladimir Putin’s speech at the Munich security conference in February 2007. The second surprise was President Medvedev’s decision to deploy Russian troops in South Ossetia in response to the Georgian invasion of that selfproclaimed Caucasian republic.
The Kremlin said the Georgian-Ossetian conflict “marked the evolution of a fundamentally new geopolitical situation.” This means that Russia has the ability to uphold its interests without looking in the direction of Washington. After years of decline, the Russian army has restored its combat capability, is receiving more novel weapons and changing its structure and form. From now on, Russia intends to adequately react to any threat to its security. Medvedev has also announced the measures he has approved in response to the deployment of the US ballistic missile system in Poland and the Czech Republic. He has stopped the liquidation of the remaining three missile regiments of the Kozelsk missile division, which was to be finished by 2010.
The division itself will be restored to its former strength, and modern Iskander missile systems will be deployed in Russia’s westernmost Kaliningrad Region to neutralise the US ABM system in Europe. Radars will be used to counter ABM systems.
However, Russia does not intend to resume the arms race or reignite confrontation with the United States or other NATO countries. There will not be another Cold War, contrary to what the West predicts, although Russia is taking adequate measures to protect itself from external threats.
Moreover, the Kremlin is energetically advocating the establishment of a new global security architecture.
