NARRATOR: The people of Kosovo and Serbia were not the only victims of the recent war. US-Russian relations suffered as well. The relationship had already been aggravated by the expansion of NATO, the US plan to build a national missile defense system, and a collapsed economy for which many Russian politicians were all too happy to blame the United States.

But Russia did play a vital role in ending the war and President Clinton has consistently gone out of his way to acknowledge and praise the Russians for their help. Peace throughout a good part of the world hinges on US-Russian cooperation.

Now that Kosovo is mostly behind us and NATO expansion completed for the time being, the questions are: Can our relations with Russia be repaired? Can we avoid a new Cold War? Can cooperation be restored and perhaps expanded? Can America and Russia become reliable partners in establishing a more stable and peaceful world?

["America's Defense Monitor" program introduction.]

Recent events in relations between Russia and the United States have been troubling. A US military attache was expelled from Moscow, evoking Cold War memories. Two Russian TU-95 bombers appeared near Iceland for the first time in years in war games practicing a response to invasion by NATO. The surprising and deliberate deployment of a small Russian force to the Kosovo airport, beating NATO to the punch, brought cheers from local Serbs and patriotic applause back home. But the NATO members, especially the US, saw the Russian action as provocative.

MR. ERMARTH: "Well, they did a stunt they feel they could be proud of, and it was pretty impressive."

NARRATOR: Fritz Ermarth retired in 1998 from the Central Intelligence Agency after a 35-year career that included chairmanship of the National Intelligence Council.

MR. ERMARTH: I mean, can you imagine our commanders sending 200 teenagers on a 500-mile forced march into what at least by their likes was hostile territory, with no air cover, three days of provision, and an extremely uncertain, to say the least, reaction on the part of their adversary partners? That was a bold maneuver."

NARRATOR: But the same event that ignited patriotic fervor in Russia increased doubts about Russia in the West.

Michael McFaul is one of America's leading experts on Russia. He is a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington.

MR. McFAUL: "What does it say to the rest of the world? It says that Russia is not a partner we can trust, that we are still in an antagonistic relationship with them, and it does this kind of long-term damage."

NARRATOR: For several reasons, relations were rocky even before the war in Yugoslavia. The expansion of the NATO military alliance to its borders raised considerable fear in Russia. As General Brent Scowcroft, national security advisor to President George Bush, explains:

GEN. SCOWCROFT: "I think the Russians could be excused if they think that all this is happening to them because they're weak and we're taking advantage of that weakness. Thus, again, reminding them how they've changed and furthering their humiliation."

[Before House International Relations Committee]

NARRATOR: Many Russians have blamed the United States for Russia's terrible economic conditions and loss of international power. Today, Russia is a country of 150 million people with an economy barely as large as that of Pennsylvania and New Jersey combined. The war against Serbia brought Russian anger to a boiling point and united Russians as never before.

Alexander Pikayev is a leading Russian expert on foreign affairs. He works at the Carnegie Moscow Center.

MR. PIKAYEV: "Outrage in Moscow was very high and according to public opinion polls, more than 90 percent of Russians denounced NATO air strikes against Yugoslavia."

NARRATOR: Jonas Bernstein is an experienced American journalist who has spent most of the 1990s in Moscow. He works for the Jamestown Foundation and the Moscow Times.

MR. BERNSTEIN: "I have never met a Russian who supports it, not one, and I've talked to many."

NARRATOR: The initial Russian response to the war was very hostile with President Yeltsin and others threatening a military response. But hot rhetoric soon gave way to constructive action when Yeltsin appointed former Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin to be his Yugoslav trouble-shooter and diplomatic envoy. Chernomyrdin has many American contacts.

The United States welcomed Russia's help. Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott, the government's top expert on Russia, went to Moscow several times and worked closely with Chernomyrdin in seeking a peaceful settlement.

Michael McFaul says Chernomyrdin seeks cooperation with the West.

MR. McFAUL: "Mr. Chernomyrdin, in my view, is a pro-Western pragmatist who sees cooperation with the West as something that is in Russia's national interest and, therefore, he wanted to broker a settlement to keep the push towards integration of Russia into Europe on board."

NARRATOR: Dale Herspring confirms the central role of Russia in ending the war. Herspring is a respected expert on the Russian military and a former naval officer and State Department official.

CPT. HERSPRING (USN, Ret.): "Milosevic for a long time was trying to play the Russian card. And once he realized that Yeltsin and Chernomyrdin were simply not going to put up with it, I think that was more critical in turning him around than I think a lot of the bombing was."

NARRATOR: Thoughtful postwar appraisals have cast doubts on just how effective NATO's bombing campaign was in forcing Milosevic to agree to a settlement. Most of the Yugoslav military apparatus apparently emerged virtually unscathed. Some observers believe Russia's threat to cut off its vital supply of natural gas to Serbia was a primary reason Milosevic agreed to withdraw his troops from Kosovo, a threat that was all too real since Chernomyrdin was formerly head of Gazprom, the big Russian national gas company.

MR. ERMARTH: "This is not over. There's going to be a lot of management of this crisis to rebuild, to extract some good things out of it and, above all, to avert very bad things that could still happen."

NARRATOR: Whatever lessons may be drawn from the war, Russia and the United States now face a continuing challenge in carrying out complicated peacekeeping operations in Kosovo. Cooperation will be critical in making this most difficult mission a success.

According to Fritz Ermarth, new tensions could arise.

MR. ERMARTH: "Here we are chock-a-block with Russian forces in Kosovo and the fact is, they have a clientele that's, for us, on the enemy side and we have a clientele that may or may not be all that manageable. And I can bet my paycheck that Milosevic has a plan to get us shooting at each other."

NARRATOR: Russia's assistance to the United States and NATO has been controversial in Russia. Some Russians have complained of abandonment of the Serbian cause. Russia and the United States saw the war in Yugoslavia from quite different perspectives.

Not only does Russia still feel a debt of gratitude for Yugoslavia's underground, keeping thousands of German troops pinned down during World War II, but Russians and Serbs also have strong ethnic and religious ties. At a recent congressional hearing, Representative James Leach, a highly regarded member of the House International Relations Committee, emphasized the historical roots of friendship between Serbia and Russia.

Rep. JAMES LEACH (R-IA):

"What is happening in Russia today is a profound

reflection of Russian history and Russian attitudes

towards religion. Everybody knows that they have a

circumstance of identifying with the Serbs because of

the Orthodox Church.

"In addition, in 1941, every Russian believes the Serbs

held up the German army, Operation Barbarosa. And by

that two-week hold-up, German tanks froze outside of

Moscow three days before Christmas, And that saved

Moscow and possibly Leningrad. That is the principal

reason the Russians totally identify with Serbia."

NARRATOR: Other experts put less emphasis on ethnic, religious and historical ties in explaining Russian attitudes on the war in Yugoslavia.

MR. BERNSTEIN: "And that's undoubtedly part of it, but I think that they don't like it for the same reason a lot of Americans probably don't like it or a lot of Europeans: They don't like it because they're against it and they think it's an unjustified war."

NARRATOR: Above all, the Russians resented being excluded from a role in the Balkans. NATO's unilateral resort to force, excluding both the United Nations and Russia, seemed like Russia's worst fears about NATO expansion coming true.

MR. PIKAYEV: "Russia's very concerned that NATO is starting to play a role of self-appointment policeman and a judge at the same time, which could potentially have very ruinous effect on the overall international system."

NARRATOR: In the wake of NATO's decision to launch air strikes against Kosovo, Russia moved to sever all its ties to the alliance. Moscow withdrew its liaison officers from NATO Headquarters in Brussels and discontinued its participation in the Russia-NATO Permanent Joint Council, the primary institutional vehicle for cooperation between Russia and NATO.

Fundamentally, the Russians saw NATO's action without any consultation with them as an arrogant lack of respect for Russia's concerns about issues that were important to them.

MR. McFAUL: "They feel like they have been dragged through the 1990s as a crumbling superpower, as a country in disarray, and they would like to be treated with more respect as an international player."

MR. BERNSTEIN: "The Russians were deeply resentful not so much because the Serbs were Slavs, but because in the beginning, the Russians were excluded. And it's a case of inferiority complex. It's a case of a country that lost its power, that couldn't do anything.

NARRATOR: After the start of the war in Yugoslavia, people poured into the streets in all major Russian cities protesting NATO bombing. Protestors showered the American embassy with eggs, cans of paint, and empty bottles. They gave different reasons for their actions.

[Interviews with protestors through translator.]

PROTESTOR 1: "I came here to support our own because I don't want conflict."

INTERVIEWER: "What's your opinion on what's going on here right now?"

PROTESTOR 2: "We have to do this. We have to show that Russia cannot be humiliated by everyone. We must stand by each other."

INTERVIEWER: "Excuse me. What brought you here?"

PROTESTOR 3: "My conscience. You see, we have this concept: I am a Russian, I am a Slav."

PROTESTOR 4: "All of them be damned, Bill Clinton and Yeltsin both! They brought us to this situation. My family is starving. My kids are not getting paid. They go here, no money. They go there, no money. I'll be damned! Damn their children and their grandchildren!"

PROTESTOR 5: "My personal opinion? My country should take no one's side. Not the Serbs', not anyone's. I think NATO right now represents a real danger for us and for the entire world."

"As for Russia, taking anyone's side right now is not smart. We're not able to. We can't provide any real support. We have to think of our own self-defense."

NARRATOR: Anti-American demonstrations on the part of the communists and extreme nationalists had previously been limited. Now young people expressed their disenchantment with the United States. Michael McFaul finds this a disturbing trend.

MR. McFAUL: "Well, I think right now in the wake of Kosovo, we have lost their confidence. The young people of Russia we always banked on as being our allies, our fifth column in Russia, and once they came to power, then our interests would be better served. And we have to do something to regain their -- loyalty's the wrong word -- to regain their commitment to values that we have."

NARRATOR: General Scowcroft thinks the United States should take more care to avoid attitudes and actions that stimulate the worst reactions in Russia.

GEN. SCOWCROFT:

"I think we are in danger of promoting by our actions,

not by our policies, a virulent anti-West, anti-US

nationalism which we will come to regret in the coming

years."

[Before House International Relations Committee.]

NARRATOR: One of the greatest sources of Russian anxiety is NATO's new assertiveness and the fear that NATO might become engaged even closer to Russia's borders. The Russians view the oil-rich region around the Caspian Sea on Russia's southern border as a possible flashpoint.

MR. PIKAYEV: "However, there are concerns about possible NATO involvement in the Caucasus and we monitor discussions in NATO around that. And it would be even more severe -- it would cause more severe damage for the West and Russian relationship that present disagreements, let's say -- let's call them that -- around Kosovo."

NARRATOR: But other experts don't think NATO has much interest in getting involved on Russia's turf.

CPT. HERSPRING: "I don't think NATO in its wildest dream wants to get into interfering in Russian internal affairs. If a country totally collapsed and had nuclear weapons -- this is a worst-case scenario -- who knows?"

NARRATOR: Kosovo is only one of our problems with Russia. Russian suspicion of the United States and NATO was already rising before the war in Yugoslavia. Where once most Russians were pro-American, their hostility toward the United States is now at its highest point since the Cold War ended.

When Jonas Bernstein arrived in Moscow in 1992, Russians were enthusiastic about the United States.

MR. BERNSTEIN: "There was a sense that, you know, the United States can help us and we want to be like you, etc. That already began to wither away well before the Yugoslav war started. So, I think in some senses the Yugoslavs' war became merely a catalyst for things which had already been present for awhile. And that disillusionment had set in because of the failure of economic reform in Russia, that I'm quite sure of."

NARRATOR: One consequence of the economic failures in Russia has been the collapse of the Russian military. Russian citizens have been alarmed by this turn of events and Americans have become increasingly concerned about the safety of Russia's nuclear arsenal.

Russia has about 20,000 nuclear weapons and her annual military budget, in rubles to dollars, is barely $5 billion. The United States' military budget is more than 50 times greater, at $280 billion.

CPT. HERSPRING: "The situation with in the military is catastrophic. They eat primarily vegetables, some cases of dog food has been given to them. I guess the best case -- a comment that I heard was a Russian saying that potatoes are better guarded than nuclear weapons because the situation's so bad."

MR. BERNSTEIN: "The material conditions for the average serviceman is so bad that you regularly see enlisted men begging in the streets of Moscow. This is a very, very disturbing thing to see and I think it's a source of shame for a lot of Russians."

NARRATOR: With Russia's conventional forces bordering on collapse, she increasingly relies on her nuclear forces. United States military analysts consider this to be dangerous. Recently Russia's military carried out mock nuclear strikes in a major exercise.

CPT. HERSPRING: "I mean the biggest danger we have right now with the Russians from a military standpoint is their conventional forces have collapsed, they are putting increased reliance on nuclear weapons."

NARRATOR: But even with the growth of anti-American sentiments in Russia, Dale Herspring finds the Russian military eager for cooperation with the United States military. American and Russian forces have had a number of successful training exercises and joint programs.

CPT. HERSPRING: "The U.S. military certainly had a very positive experience in dealing with Russians. The Russian military worked much better dealing with other militaries than they do with their own citizens. They tend to be very professional."

NARRATOR: Russia's desire for cooperation and help extend beyond the military. Russia is deeply in debt to the International Monetary Fund and other Western creditors.

MR. ERMARTH: "For all the huffing and puffing and anger and resentment, not to put too fine a point on it, they need the money. So, there's the whole IMF-related agenda. And I think resentments of the West and of the United States have not gone so far as to completely eliminate the political value of some rapport. I don't think they have turned their back completely on the arms control agenda, they've got a stake in some of those things and recognize it."

MR. McFAUL: "I believe so for the simple fact that I think most Russian elites and even the anti-Western hardliners, even the Communist Party believe that they need some form of integration with the West to get ahead in the world. And they look at the laggards in the international community of states and those that are those that have been left out of the international system."

NARRATOR: Despite the aggravations and tensions that exist today, Russia and the United States have important interests in common. Both sides have consistently shown a responsible attitude about reducing the threat of a nuclear war. Their common interests include: Stopping the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. Containing regional conflicts. Protecting the world's environment. And establishing a firmer economic foundation for Russia's new democratic institutions. They both also face new complications on the international scene with China.

MR. PIKAYEV: "Still I think the U.S. and Russia share important geo-political interests. First of all, in the Far East. Russia could also play a very important role as the only continental power in Asia which still -- and for the few next decades, 10, 15 or even 20 years -- could provide a useful geo-political balance for emerging Chinese superpower.

Russia and the United States are also interested in settling conflicts along Russian periphery in Asia. And we can also find a couple of dozens of other conflicts where Russia and U.S. interests are in parallel."

NARRATOR: Russia could be particularly helpful to the United States in dealing with those countries the US calls rogue states. Ironically, based on old ties from Soviet days, Russia has influence in places like Iran and Iraq, where the United States faces open hostility.

MR. McFAUL: "Russia has a lot of relationships with countries that the West has conflicts with. And therefore, to have a cooperative relationship on Iran, on Iraq, on Korea could be very useful both for Russia and for the West."

NARRATOR: The United States has strongly urged Russia not to sell arms to rogue states. This presents a dilemma for Russia which desperately needs the money arms sales would produce and which would also help keep their arms industry busy. The two countries face continuing controversy over Russian military deals with countries like Syria and Libya and nuclear power cooperation with Iran.

Unless Russia and the United States cooperate in resolving these difficult issues, Michael McFaul worries that US-Russian relations could become even more tense. Relations could suffer a severe and perhaps irreversible breach if Russia were to engage in proliferation of nuclear technology to our most ardent adversaries.

MR. McFAUL: "The thing that I'm worried the most about are issues of nuclear proliferation. And that is an issue that Russia can concretely threaten the interests of the West and the United States and under a different administration that's not so wedded to cooperation with the West, you might see that happen in Moscow."

NARRATOR: General Scowcroft also argues that the United States should work more closely with Russia in containing proliferation threats and dangers of nuclear war. He believes Russia would be amenable to overtures from the United States regarding proliferation of weapons to the rogue states.

GEN. SCOWCROFT:

"We are doing things unconsciously to the Russians that

are driving them into hyper-nationalism. It's not our

intent, but we need to look at our policies and try to

see if there are not ways we can engage the Russians.

On non-proliferation, we just beat up on them on Iran.

Have we asked them to help us with North Korea? With

Libya? With all the others? No. Why not go to them

and say, 'Look, we both face this threat? Why not

cooperate?'"

[Before House International Relations Committee.]

NARRATOR: While Russia is weak today, it still has considerable capacity to make trouble if the West does not treat it as an important and respected partner. The Russians already feel that too often they are simply patronized for the sake of appearance. Many experts believe that US interests would be best served if Russia sees the United States as an ally aiding her recovery, not as a nation taking comfort from her misery.

MR. PIKAYEV: "The Russian sensitivities should be met seriously here. Because even despite Russian weaknesses, many Russian economic weaknesses, because everyone I think would have to remember that if it is not done, Russia would be very dangerous, indeed, very dangerous again."

NARRATOR: Nations tend to remember the nations which treated them with respect when they needed it most. They remember and resent even longer those whom they feel kicked them while they were down, or at least were indifferent to them when they needed help.

Dale Herspring sees an historic opportunity and challenge for the United States in working with Russia in its hour of need.

CPT. HERSPRING: "Russia's down now, but Russia's not down forever. The situation may even get worse, but at some point the Russians and the Russian military will be back. And the questions will be then: Where are they? What do they think? Do they look upon us as a country that kicked them when they were down or do they look upon us as a country that tried to help them when they were down? I would much prefer the later than the former."

NARRATOR: If the 21st Century is to be more peaceful than the 20th, U.S./Russian relations must ultimately be put on a firmer, more permanent basis. The rollercoaster ups and downs of recent years can only lead to an insecure world with constant tensions that serve neither American nor Russian interests.

The war in Yugoslavia has been a severe test of the ability of the United States and Russia to work together. It can be fairly said that the results, that is, the end of hostilities in Kosovo were highly beneficial to both nations. It was a clear case of how cooperation can benefit both countries in a very substantial way. The lessons of Kosovo should be a guide for the future.