Nikolai Zlobin is the director of Russian and Asian programs at the Center for Defense Information in Washington DC, and editor-in-chief of the Washington ProFile News Agency. 

Interesting times are coming in the Russian-American relationship. Duma elections, followed by the presidential election, are rapidly approaching. And while the latter’s results will not be questioned in Washington, the political establishment is eager to see what Putin’s pre-election agenda will have to say about foreign policy issues the US cares about, such as the war on international terrorism, the war in Iraq, the situation in Iran, the Middle East, the Caucuses, and Central Asia. 

No Basis for Partnership 

Moreover, Americans are curious to see how Putin formulates the policies on the partnership with the US and integration with the West. After Voloshin’s departure, many people here are expressing doubts that the search for a partnership with the US will be as high a priority as before. 

On the other hand, there is only a year left until the Presidential elections in the US, as well as the elections of a third of the nation’s Congress. Undoubtedly, the Republican Bush’s victory brought great benefits to Russia. In recent American history, there has been no other president as pro-Russian as George W. Bush. Democrats were less agreeable on such issues as, for example, Chechnya or freedom of the press. But the American establishment’s attention was shifted by the White House, from Russia’s internal concerns to her status as a strategic partner in the war on terrorism. Still, a coherent, full-fledged model for partnership was not found. In Iraq, America did not receive Russia’s support, cooperation in WMD non-proliferation was hampered by disagreements over Iran, and “Yukos-gate” discouraged proponents of an energy alliance with Moscow. 

After the arrest of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, and after concrete American companies and investors began to lose concrete money, the White House found itself no longer able to ignore Russia’s domestic situation, even if it couched its position in the softest terms possible. America’s foreign policy was designed for creating the best possible opportunities for American business around the whole world. Now Bush himself can become a target for criticism. There is nothing worse for the White House than having its calls for investment in a certain region lead to faithful businessmen losing money simply because the administration overestimated the level of political stability, transparency, and predictability of the unfolding events. 

Both capitals are facing the necessity of re-thinking their positions toward each other and developing a program of cooperation for the new presidential terms. Moscow cannot ignore the fact that Bush’s reelection chances are not nearly as good as a they looked even a few months ago, although the recent economic successes can protect him from repeating the political fate of his own father. If a democrat wins the presidential election, we can expect a growing interest in Russia’s domestic problems, and Washington’s return to a policy based on the situation inside Russia rather than global events and Moscow’s reactions to them.

Washington, meanwhile, is examining the degree of Putin’s real political ability to implement what was initially a part of his political program and brought him support and sympathy in the US. The results of his first term cannot help but create a sense of skepticism among Americans. Constantly recurring questions such as “Who are you, Mr. Putin?”, “Where are you, Mr. Putin?” and “Who stands behind Mr. Putin?” do not give much encouragement to either politicians or investors.

A Sense of Reticence

Today it’s difficult to gauge the possibility that a rethinking of their respective positions will lead the countries in a beneficial direction. All three last Kremlin leaders – Gorbachev, Yeltsin, and Putin – enjoyed unprecedented support in the West, especially in Washington. Relations between Russia and the West in general, and Russia and the US in particular, in the past 15 years have transversed a historic trajectory from enemies to possible strategic cooperation. But recently Sergei Ivanov – apparently the second most powerful man in the country, in terms of political influence – explicitly stated that it’s uncertain what the relationship between Russia and the US is at the moment. Not enemies, but definitely not allies, he said. Such a sense of reticence is felt in Washington as well. The two presidents, it seems, fully trust each other while their elites and societies do not. Ivanov confessed that he himself does not always believe what his American partners tell him.

But if Russia’s power structure, tradition, and political culture allow Putin to ignore the elite’s opinion, or to pressure it with his “administrative resources”, Bush does not have that capability. If he cannot convince big business, the experts, and his establishment to accept Russia as a partner, then his good relations with Putin will remain a personal matter. In other words, if Putin “makes policy”, then president Bush “influences policy”, even if that influence is significant. Here, the differences between the political mechanisms and cultures of Russia and America are especially noticeable, and are a barrier to mutual understanding and trust.

In everything – from arms control to student exchange – the cultural conflict, time and again, proceeds along the same dimension. Russians would like to negotiate everything, preferably at the highest political level possible, to receive the necessary permissions and approbations, sign the appropriate declarations and then, with a clear conscience, began cooperating. “How can we work, if there are no clear guarantees and agreed-upon conditions, how can you trust a partner if there is no formal mechanism?” – that is the standard Russian logic.

The American approach is exactly the opposite – at the beginning, work on the lowest levels, define through experience what works and what doesn’t, collect that experience, make sure that everything works, and only then begin thinking about formal declarations and long-term plans. “How can you negotiate and sign agreements if it’s unclear what will work and what will not?” – is the American logic.

In other words, neither in politics nor in business does America rely on formalizing cooperation until grass-roots experience shows what works. The more cooperative programs and projects successfully cooperate in different fields, even ones without a formal government approval, the higher the chances that Russia and the US will create a real, substantive partnership.

Only then, the reality can be fortified through high-level agreements. But if no cooperation is tested out, it’s unlikely that any American leader or official will agree to sign anything. In other words, the American approach is from practice to agreements, while the Russian approach is from agreements to practice. Any diplomat who has experience in Russian-American negotiations knows how fundamental that difference is.

The Cowardly Dollar

The future of Russian-American relations depends not on how well the presidents of the two countries relate to each other, but on how successfully their people, elites, and societies are able to cooperate. A special status is created, in the eyes of Americans, not through “successful summits”, which they ignore no less easily than unsuccessful ones, but full-fledged relations at the level of civil society, at the level of small and middle-sized business – at the human level. The US president can help initiate such relations, he can campaign for them, but no one can be forced to participate in them. It is precisely in this sense that George W. Bush doesn’t “make policy”, but influences it with the help of the political mechanisms available to him, as well as with his own personal authority.

Khodorkovsky’s arrest so far has not wrought great damage on the relations between Bush and Putin. But the manner in which Russia’s richest businessman was “wiped out in the outhouse”, and the reasons behind his arrest, created a big impression on American entrepreneurs as well as the general public.

The American dollar, for all its valor, is a cowardly thing, and runs away at the first signs of danger, especially when that danger is coming from government sources. In the past years, the US has been through approximately 50 large business scandals, but not one investigation was initiated by the government – in all cases, the alarm was raised by non-government structures, the press, or the businessmen themselves. That’s why American businessmen are a little disappointed by the passive reaction of their Russian colleagues to the Yukos situation, to the cool-and-collected ponderings in the press about “who’s next.” For Americans, this is a greater indicator of the Russian business environment than any euphoric communiqués about summit results or triumphal promises of presidents.

Neither side can forget reality and lose the historical perspective. In the end, the fate of Russian-American relations depends not on their geopolitical dependency on each other, for that, as we know, is transient. Not does it depend on the level of mutual trust between the two presidents, or the presence of a common foe: history has dismissed such hopes more than once. It depends on how much American and Russian societies can take these relations into their own hands, developing and strengthening them regardless of who is in the Kremlin or the White House, or what formal agreements bind the two countries. As banal as it may sounds, it depends on the level of freedom and democracy, on the business environment and the level of trust between people.

Translated by Seva Gunitskiy, Washington ProFile Associate Editor.