Everett, Wash.
Published: Sunday, July 5, 2009

'Reset' with Russia won't make headway

 MOSCOW -- The Obama administration has talked about a "reset" in Russian-American relations. But a Russian analyst shrugs his shoulders when he's asked about the term. "What happens when you press the reset button on a computer?" he muses. "It goes dark, and then after a while the same screen comes back again."

That skeptical comment offers the right perspective on President Obama's visit here, which starts Monday. Both Russians and Americans want to avoid a failure, and the summit is likely to yield a joint "presidential commission" and other modest agreements. But neither side is ready to address the other's fundamental security concerns. And until that changes, this week's reset will mean more of the same -- and perhaps even a new jolt of static.

Russian leaders have been simmering with anger since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. A top Kremlin adviser voiced a litany of complaints to a group of Western visitors: Russia needed American help during the chaos of the 1990s, but it never came; Russia tried to aid America after Sept. 11, 2001, but, he claims, the ungrateful U.S. helped Muslim terrorists in Chechnya by giving them passports and money; Russia wanted to cooperate on security, but the Bush administration pushed NATO expansion to Russia's borders and plotted to build missile defense sites in nearby Poland and the Czech Republic.

"America owes Russia, and it owes a lot, and it has to pay its debt," growled this key adviser to President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. His message was that America's past actions had threatened Russia's security, and the Kremlin wasn't about to forget it.

Given what they see as American disdain for their interests, the Russians drag their feet on U.S. security worries such as the Iranian nuclear program. "Iran is an American mania," says another Putin adviser dismissively. "Maybe it goes back to your fear of the Indians (in the Wild West). We don't know. Iran is a problem of yours, not of ours."

What's missing is a real strategic dialogue that would identify each side's key interests and allow some creative bargaining. "The Russian agenda is largely a set of negatives -- things they don't want us to do," says Tom Graham, a former Russia expert at the State Department who now works for Kissinger Associates. America's agenda is a similar list of "don'ts," Graham says. "You can't build a long-term relationship on negatives."

This week's summit will at least break the ice. Obama will meet separately with Medvedev, the country's nominal leader, and Putin, the former president who still holds the real power. The Kremlin's attitude toward Obama is, "Let's test the guy, see what he can do," says the Putin adviser.

The Obama administration has already made clear it won't bargain on the issues that concern Russia most. "We're not going to reassure or give or trade ... anything with the Russians regarding NATO expansion or missile defense," White House aide Michael McFaul told The Wall Street Journal. The Russians have been sending similar thumbs-down signals.

Shorn of its superpower status, Russia is carrying a huge chip on its shoulder. People here speak often about their sense of "humiliation." A billionaire businessman, for example, tells me Russia withdrew its application to join the World Trade Organization because "Mr. Putin decided it will humiliate Russia." The top Kremlin adviser says Ukraine matters to Moscow because ethnic Russians there plead, "When are you going to stop our humiliation?"

"We are entering a period in Russian-American relations that's more dangerous than what preceded it," warns Ivan Krastev, a Bulgarian who heads the Centre for Liberal Strategies, which organized a conference last week on these issues. He cautions: "Here, anti-Americanism is a state-building resource. You should face it."

This is what happens when empires collapse. The tension was masked after the Soviet Union's demise, but it's back. Russian journalist Valery Fadeev underscores the existential nature of Russia's angst when he quotes a remark Putin made last year that "Russia would either return to the group of leading world nations or disappear."

The Obama magic won't solve these problems. A real reset of Russian-American relations will require intense discussion, and some serious give and take. The two countries will have to address each other's anxieties.

America had the luxury of taking Russia for granted in the years after 1991, but that's riskier now: Russia is a wounded and weakened bear, but it still can do some major damage. Ignoring the bear and hoping it goes away isn't a strategy.



David Ignatius is a Washington Post columnist. His e-mail address is davidignatius@washpost.com.
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