#3
Versty
No. 131
November 15, 2001
[translation from RIA Novosti for personal use only]
RUSSIAN EXPERT COMMENTS ON PUTIN'S US VISIT
By Boris MAKARENKO, deputy director of the Center of Political Technologies, comments on the Russian leader's current US visit.

Many people expected the current Russian-US summit to create a new world order. Still I get the impression that both Presidents have altered Russia's status instead.

It goes without saying that the world continues to change after those horrendous September 11 terrorist attacks. Relations between the United States and Europe continue to change in different directions and at varying speeds. US and European positions are being strengthened in some areas. However, the most serious changes have something to do with Russia's global positions. The vestiges of the Cold War have now been overcome completely. Russia used to hang in limbo during the last decade, that is after the downfall of communism, with the West regarding our country as its half-enemy and half-friend. Each of these two aspects used to prevail time and again; however, one can now safely say that the foundation of Russia's new and long-term relations with the Western world and the United States, in particular is now being created. This seems to be the gist of the Putin-Bush summit at the US President's Texas ranch.

We are witnessing many positive signals at this stage; however, such signals are mostly symbolic, rather than real. International relations are bedevilled with some extremely complicated problems; as a matter of fact, experts, diplomats, institutions of state authority, etc. should fill each such problem with real content. For example, it became clear after the summit's first day that Russia expected the United States to abolish the discriminatory Jackson-Vanick amendment, which doesn't grant most-favored nation status to Russia. However, US Congress alone can accomplish this objective. Nonetheless, we have become convinced for the first time in ten years that this amendment will be abolished. How long will such proceedings last? Well, it's still hard to say. Frankly speaking, the President of the United States used to rescind this amendment each year by his directive. However, it was always possible that the Jackson-Vanick amendment would be enacted once again in case of aggravated bilateral relations.

Russia will, doubtless, be recognized as a market-economy country. However, this will require judicial proceedings for several consecutive months. It goes without saying that our two countries are going to compromise on the ABM (Anti-Ballistic Missile) Treaty. I personally was alarmed, after learning about the gist of linking the ABM issue with the reduction of strategic offensive arms. Bush then made a unilateral statement to the effect that the United States was ready to scale down its ICBM potential. In response, Putin hailed the US intention, noting that Russia was also ready to examine this issue. Strange, as it may seem, but unilateral moves are much worse than a bilateral treaty just because such moves can't be called something mandatory. I'd like to stress once again that I don't oppose the linkage of these two issues because Russia would perceive this as a very good option. The gist of such linkage seems essential. Quite possibly, the United States and Russia, which are meeting each other halfway, can go back to their respective "jump-off positions", if need be. Naturally enough, a concrete treaty stipulating mandatory joint actions has to be signed in this sphere.

The sides continue to discuss the NATO issue in a positive manner; however, this still constitutes nothing but a declaration of intent.

Quite a few predictions were made before the summit, with some people talking about a grandiose break-through. Still others claimed that the summit won't produce any results whatsoever. Paradoxically enough, all of them are right. No specific landmark decisions have been reached during the summit. You see, it will take months and even years to solve all problems and to adopt the relevant decisions. However, we can see obvious progress, with the sides merging their positions on virtually every issue (that had divided Russia and the United States only six months ago). This constitutes the main result of the Putin-Bush summit. It's pretty hard to over-estimate the summit's global significance because we should assess subsequent developments.

Russia will apparently obtain a new global status, if this process continues to develop.

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