A big foreign policy challenge awaiting the next U.S. President is the > frosty relationship with an angry, resurgent Russia. Talk about a post-Cold War partnership between the world’s two greatest military powers is now a thing of the past. It looks like a throwback to the Cold War days with Russia and the U.S. fighting a proxy war in Ukraine, > leading two competing military operations in Syria and raising allegations and counter-allegations on a host of issues, ranging from human rights violations and breaking international norms to interfering in each other’s domestic politics. Tensions came to a head this month when the U.S. pulled out of talks with Russia over the Syria conflict. This was immediately after President Vladimir Putin abandoned a key nuclear disarmament treaty with Washington, demanding the removal of sanctions on Moscow. If the belligerence and intransigence both countries display are any indication, international politics is set to get a lot more murky. There could be several triggers for this escalation, but the real problem is that the Cold War-era mistrust between Washington and Moscow was never really buried. Friction has been increasingly evident on the watch of President Putin, as he pursues an aggressive foreign policy framed around what he regards as Russian interests. This happened in Georgia in 2008, Ukraine in 2014 and Syria the year after. In turn, the Obama administration’s coercive diplomacy in dealing with Russia’s aggression has widened the rift. The > suspension of Russia from the G8 moved Moscow farther away from the West, while sanctions negated the goodwill built, since the 1990s, between Moscow and the West.
To be sure, Russia is a shadow of what the Soviet Union was at its peak. Its economy is struggling in the wake of the slump in oil prices. Its currency is in a free fall. Its geopolitical influence is largely limited to the Central Asia and Caucasus. And its foreign policy doesn’t have any high moral ground—the interference in Ukraine was a direct threat to the modern international system, while in Syria it’s defending a brutal regime that’s accused of killing its own citizens. But in an international system largely dominated by the U.S., Russia, still an extremely consequential military power, remains the key player whose cooperation is necessary to resolve several of today’s crises. Treating it as a “rogue” nation or trying to isolate and weaken it through sanctions and other means could only be counterproductive. The >Iran nuclear deal shows that even the most complex international issues could be resolved if Russia and the U.S. work together with creative diplomacy. Ideally, that should set the model for U.S.-Russia partnership.
