By announcing a desire to push the "reset" button in U.S.-Russian relations, however, the U.S. has indicated that it is ready to take Russian misconduct off the table and treat Russia's desire to dominate its neighbors as worthy of discussion. Russia is not pushing any reset button. Medvedev is free to treat our desire to start again as a tacit admission of guilt. He can insist that Obama repair the damage done by U.S. policies and demand action instead of words.
Every U.S. administration invents the world anew, but Obama has gone further than most. His desire to repair U.S.-Russian relations, however, could undermine U.S. deterrence. Russia is not entitled to a "zone of privileged interest" that includes sovereign nations, and any steps to create one could lead to situations that also seriously threaten the U.S.
There are three issues that are likely to dominate Wednesday's meeting between the two leaders: U.S. missile defense installations in Eastern Europe, the expansion of NATO to include the former Soviet republics of Ukraine and Georgia, and Russian support for the nuclear aspirations of Iran. In each case, the problem is not a clash of interests but frank Russian imperial pretensions.
The question of missile defense in Eastern Europe should be a nonissue. Ten ground-based interceptors planned for Poland are not enough to threaten hundreds of Russian ICBMs. They are also in the wrong place. A Russian missile attack on the U.S. would be launched over the North Pole. The nonnuclear intercept missiles planned for Poland are slow and cannot catch up with Russian ICBMs, particularly from a distance of thousands of miles.
Russia, however, wants a veto over the placement of military infrastructure on the territory of its former Warsaw Pact allies. If this were granted, it would create two classes of nations within the Western alliance, those that need Russian permission for military deployments and those that do not. For this reason alone it should not be considered.
The issues involved in the debate over NATO expansion are similar. The accession of Georgia and Ukraine to NATO is described by Russian leaders as part of an effort to isolate and contain Russia, and they have vowed to prevent it at all costs. In August 2008, Russia, after months of preparation, invaded Georgia--ostensibly to defend the secessionist enclave of South Ossetia but in reality to subordinate Georgia and intimidate the Western alliance.
According to Pavel Felgenhauer, a Russian defense analyst, the decision to invade came in April, after NATO failed to offer outright a Membership Action Plan to Georgia and Ukraine at its annual summit in Bucharest, Romania. This sign of irresolution encouraged Russia to act. Further irresolution, however, will give Russia a veritable license to intimidate and create a zone of instability between Russia and NATO that neither side can adequately control.
Finally, Russia's policy toward Iran is also motivated, albeit indirectly, by Russia's desire to dominate its neighbors. A nuclear-armed Iran would not seem to be in Russia's interest. But Russia is seeking to recreate an empire, and support for Iran is extremely useful in forcing the West to deal with Russia on its terms.
In the run-up to the Obama-Medvedev meeting, there have been visits to Russia by former Secretaries of State Henry Kissinger, James Baker and George Schultz and a report produced by the Nixon Center and signed by former Sens. Chuck Hagel and Gary Hart that called for a freeze on the East European missile defense system and NATO expansion. The report has been widely praised in the Russian press and by Russian foreign policy experts who criticized the U.S. for, in the past, "disregarding the real significance of Russia."
Neither the Obama administration nor the supposed "wise men" who seek to advise it will do their country a service, however, if they fail to see that the real aim of Russian policy is to induce the West to accede to a grossly distorted view of Russian entitlements. The matter is particularly urgent because the Russians give signs that they are ready to back up their pretensions with force.
There is an increasingly tense situation on the Georgian-South Ossetian border, where war could break out in the spring, and Russia is supporting separatist agitation in Crimea. A Kremlin-backed youth group launched a cyber-attack against Estonia in 2007 after the Estonian government moved a Soviet war memorial from the center of Tallinn.
The West does not need to start afresh with Russia. On the contrary, it needs to reaffirm that a new president will act forcefully to defend principles that already exist--and that Russia's imperialist pretensions are seen for what they are, the specious rationalization for an unjust system of power.
In the end, the West is locked in a confrontation with Russia that is like the Cold War, in that it deals with fundamental principles. But what is different is that Russia is now seeking to impose its will without the benefit of a universal, messianic idea. If Obama and his advisers will keep this in mind when they meet Medvedev, it may protect them from Russian manipulation and help them steer clear of the snare they set for themselves when they first decided that U.S.-Russian relations could be "reset."
David Satter is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and a visiting scholar at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.
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