U.S.-Russian Ties Shaky

Commentators discussing Russian-U.S. relations in 2011 usually pinned their analysis on attempts to establish whether or not the reset was over, and what its results might have been. This approach seemed strange because as designed by its architects in spring 2009, the reset was crowned with the ratification of the START Treaty in December 2010. It embraced a limited number of issues. It was fundamentally aimed at taking bilateral relations out of the complete deadlock they found themselves mired in by the end of George W. Bush’s term in office, and making the transition to dialog. Specifically, it envisaged cooperation over strategic arms reductions, Afghanistan and sanctions against Iran. The two sides achieved all these goals. What more could the reset be expected to deliver – after all, taking this metaphor literally, it simply means pressing a button – once. Ideally, it was expected to lead to some other policy as a transition but this failed to transpire.