The Taming of the Shrew: Can Putin Be Brought to Obama’s Table?
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When Pres. Barack Obama met with his Russian counterpart, Dmitri Medvedev, the tone was optimistic, visionary, encouraging: the heads of state of the two former Cold War enemies were agreeing to historic legally binding reductions in their respective nuclear arsenals, and shifting their vocabulary toward something more akin to a consensus position on defensive weapons innovations, namely a missile shield.
The two had met before, and had from the start seen opportunities for meaningful progress in US-Russia relations. But some in Russia are uncomfortable with this dynamic: Obama’s global popularity and his unabashedly pro-democratic message lead some hardliners to see Medvedev’s willingness to negotiate so openly as a subtle but clear signal he will take a secondary role in global policy leadership.
Medvedev’s own mentor and political benefactor, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, is perhaps the leading hardliner in all of Russia, a shrewd political boss and a militant defender of Russia’s ability to project power abroad. Obama described Putin, after their first meeting, as “tough, smart, shrewd, very unsentimental and very pragmatic” on a range of issues. His diplomatic language acknowledged Putin’s tough core personality, but seemed to indicate he would like to see a more pragmatic, less ideological bilateral US-Russia relationship.
Putin is seen by many as being behind Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s comments suggesting the agreed nuclear arms reductions will not materialize if the US does not adequately assuage Russian fears about the possible offensive or strategic uses of a defensive “missile shield” in central Europe, namely Poland and the Czech Republic. Putin, then, would be the reluctant interlocutor Obama’s team must either sideline or persuade.
The negotiations are taking place across a range of agencies, at multiple levels of authority, simultaneously. Military chiefs have been involved in negotiating both transit routes through Russia to Afghanistan and work on a new round of strategic arms reductions. Top diplomats have been working on both the agreed language and the timing and means of verification for “legally binding” arms control treaties.
And, of course, Pres. Obama has met and spoken with privately the two most powerful men in Russia. Perhaps the most contentious point of difference between US and Russian policy-makers is the status of Georgia, one of the now independent former Soviet republics. When Georgia’s military moved into South Ossetia last year to undermine the spreading influence of separatist groups and reclaim territory, Russia responded with a massive military invasion of Georgian territory.
The Obama administration has been clear that its aim is to persuade Russia to remove its troops from South Ossetia. The US also favors Georgian entry onto a path to NATO membership, which Russia finds strategically and ideologically intolerable. Russia sees NATO expansion eastward as a hostile maneuver designed to surround Russia and reduce its sphere of influence; the US views it as a way of expanding the zone of protection for its allies in Europe and securing the freedom of vulnerable former Soviet republics.
Competition for natural resources in the Caucasus region is another reasons cited for US-Russian differences on the sovereignty of Georgia and neighboring nation-states. Russia, under Putin’s presidency, and now Medvedev’s, has repeatedly use its natural gas supply to force economic concessions from the European Union’s massive market, using the deadly cold of winter to impose price hikes and undermine the influence of “transit states” like Ukraine.
Kremlin watchers say the current alignment of Russian government power puts more hardline anti-American zealots in control of Russia’s government than at any time since the 1980s, perhaps even the 1970s. One recent report said that Putin and his people are “terrified” by Obama, because his popularity means they will be forced to open up Russian policy to some of the goals the US administration holds most dear.
If collaboration in the achievement of US goals is anathema to Vladimir Putin, and he proves to be as powerful a prime minister as he has said he would be, persuading Putin to either come to the table and find middle ground, or to let Medvedev lead on Russian strategic foreign policy, will be key to any substantive improvement to US-Russian relations in the near term.
Obama’s eloquent blend of populist and progressive rhetoric may startle the likes of Putin, who used his presidency to consolidate government control of the economy and batter political rivals. Obama said, in an address to the New Economic School: “The arc of history shows us that governments which serve their own people survive and thrive”. He added that “Governments which serve only their own power do not”, language some might say is a veiled criticism of Putin’s hardline tendencies.
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