(This is Part III in a series of posts from Moscow)

Where Next?
 
If the history of US-Russia relations proves anything, it is that things could always get worse.  But how can we at least try to improve the situation?  Here are a few discreet lessons and proposals for US policymakers distilled from my latest round of conversations with top Russian thinkers:
 
1)  The ball is in America’s court.  Russians believe they’ve tried and tried again to reach agreement with the Bush administration to at least enshrine the balance of the status quo in the US-Russia relationship, and yet the US keeps taking steps (Georgia, NATO expansion, missile defense) to unsettle that balance.  If Medvedev’s post-election saber-rattling shows anything, it is that Moscow is not prepared to take the first conciliatory step, even if it does not necessarily profit from escalating tension (for the past several weeks, Medvedev and Putin have been trying to minimize ripple effects from Medvedev’s ungracious reaction to Obama’s victory, and have suggested the new presidents could make progress).
 
2)  Russia will help the United States confront the Iranian nuclear and ballistic missile threat, but only if missile defense is truly and fully inclusive.  The Russian proposal to broaden missile defense to include a Russian-controlled radar site in Azerbaijan was a crucial missed opportunity to do exactly this.  But there may still be a chance to revive that offer or simply put all missile defense and radar sites in southeastern Europe and the Caucasus under formal joint NATO-Russian control.  This might sound like a non-starter from the US perspective, but it is the only way to credibly demonstrate to Russia that our goal is to defend against a missile from Iran or Pakistan, and not to take the first steps toward a comprehensive missile shield that will neutralize Russia’s nuclear deterrent.
 
3)  Ukraine cannot join NATO.  While a NATO that included Russia, or was somehow not perceived as a threat to Russia, might be possible in the long term, for the time being the US must accept the reality that Russian security and further NATO expansion are zero sum for Moscow.  Therefore, continuing to discuss NATO expansion to Ukraine in any form will be taken as a direct threat to Russian security.  The best way to open a new dialogue with Russia will be to put an explicit and indefinite hold on NATO membership for both Ukraine and Georgia, and to include Russia in a renewed effort to develop a comprehensive collective security strategy for Eastern Europe, which includes energy security.
 
4)  Restore Russia’s confidence in the United States by sending a top-level envoy to engage in direct dialogue with Russian counterparts.  Russians rightly perceive that US Russia policy has not only been indifferent to Russian interests, but for too long has been indifferent to Russia altogether.  Now is the time to restore confidence and reengage by sending the right signals.  The Kremlin will react most positively to a high-level US envoy who can speak directly for President Obama, and who can address the full range of shared interests and security challenges discussed previously.  If the US is prepared to make a handful of important concessions on missile defense and NATO expansion, the Russians will likely be prepared to engage in serious discussions about our genuinely shared interests, like halting WMD proliferation, cooperating on counter-terrorism, and combating the international drug trade, especially in Central Asia.  The US might even be surprised at Russia’s willingness to offer indispensable help in Afghanistan and the greater Central Asian region, since our long term interests in maximizing stability and decent governance in the region are shared.
 
5)  Change the tone.  The US can help ourselves immensely when it comes to Russia by showing a modicum of understanding for Russia’s security interests, its history, and what might be called its national “sense of self.”  We should finally take Jackson-Vanick off the books, and should consider taking a harder look at our rhetoric toward Russia’s former satellites in Eastern Europe, where new governments too often cozy up to virulently anti-Russian, even neo-fascist nationalists.  It would cost the US very little, and would deliver huge returns in Russian goodwill, to ask our new NATO allies in the Baltic states and East-central Europe to tone down their own provocative rhetoric and to take a hard look at whether piling on the “bash Russia” bandwagon serves their long term interests.  While small steps like these will hardly revolutionize the US-Russia relationship, they will help to set a new tone and facilitate a new dialogue about the tougher security and economic issues based on mutual goodwill instead of hostility and distrust.

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