The recognition by the American authorities of the Russian status of Crimea is one of the key steps to improve relations between Washington and Moscow. This opinion was expressed by the former employee of the US State Department Dennis Ortblad and former partner of PricewaterhouseCoopers international consulting corporation Krishen Meta on the pages of National Interest magazine.
“It’s time for the West to improve relations with Russia by pursuing a realistic political course towards it. In the long run, this will bring benefits that the sanctions we have introduced will not bring. Now is the time to act, ”the authors of the publication believe.
Among the three main steps to normalize relations Ortblad and Meta are called the recognition by the United States of the fact that Crimea will remain part of Russia. In their reasoning, authors who visited several regions of the Russian Federation state that “a significant part of the population of the peninsula is historically Russian”.
“It was obvious to us that the inhabitants of Crimea would never cease to be proud of their traditional belonging to Russia in order to agree to return to Ukraine,” the article says.
Commenting on the indicated position, the expert of the Center for Security Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences Konstantin Blokhin in an interview with RT recalled that materials of this orientation are not the first to appear.
“Such articles have been appearing not for one year, but for about three years. And they are connected with the fact that China is the main threat to the USA, and the recognition of Crimea is a tool in order to at least normalize relations with Russia, ”the expert said.
In his opinion, from the point of view of US national interests, such a policy should be called realism.
“Trump wanted to do this at the beginning of his reign, to improve relations with Russia, automatically worsening them with China. But the establishment holding back Trump believes that America has enough resources to hold back the whole world at the same time. This is the difference between realistic politics and rabid idealism, ”the expert added.
According to the analyst, the normalization of relations with Russia by the West will give a green light to similar processes in other countries. At the same time, he admits that a number of problems have to be solved to improve relations between Moscow and Washington.
“The same Iran, North Korea or Venezuela. They may and may recognize Crimea, there will be an improvement in this area, but many other “frozen” problems will remain on other issues, ”summed up Blokhin.
Russia and NATO
Among other ways of normalizing Russian-American relations, Ortblad and Meta mentioned the activation of student exchange programs and the revision of NATO's role, while reviving arms control negotiations.
According to the authors of the material, Russia is deeply concerned about the approach of the North Atlantic Alliance to the borders of the Russian Federation and the US unilateral withdrawal from the Treaty on the Elimination of Intermediate-Range and Shorter-Range Missiles (INF Treaty) - this agreement was officially terminated on August 2 at the initiative of the United States.
“The world does not become safer in conditions when NATO is about five times increasing the size of its contingent at the Russian borders, when the line between offensive and defensive weapons is blurring, and when hypersonic missiles, nuclear submarine drones and long-range tactical lasers are created on a new round of the arms race ", - the authors believe.
It is noteworthy that at the end of October, the NATO leadership issued an official statement in which the organization demanded that Russia transfer Crimea to Ukraine. The alliance noted that prior to this moment, a full-fledged dialogue with Moscow is impossible.
“There can be no business as usual until there is a clear, constructive change in Russia's actions that will comply with international law and fulfill international obligations,” the statement said after a meeting of the NATO-Ukraine commission.
In response, the official representative of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Maria Zakharova, called such statements “sounding air shock”, sounding against the background of the well-known reality and position of Moscow.
- Ayu-Dag Mountain, Crimea
- RIA News
- © Alexey Malgavko
The wave of anti-Russian publications
Note that against the background of the publication in the National Interest, a number of American media published anti-Russian publications. This was noticed in the Russian embassy in the United States.
“We see this as a well-organized attempt to support the Russophobian hysteria that has clearly gone into decline,” the diplomatic mission noted.
The embassy indicated that Russia was being charged with unreasonable accusations, and the authors were building their articles on the same template, which casts doubt on the objectivity of these media. In turn, the responses of the Russian side are “so inconvenient that they are simply censored or not published,” diplomats said.
According to Vladimir Bruter, an expert at the International Institute for Humanitarian and Political Studies, in the foreseeable future a new deterioration in relations between Moscow and Washington may occur. In his opinion, the reason for this will be the upcoming US presidential election.
“Next year, the election campaign and both sides will show that they are ready to pursue a tough policy towards Russia,” Bruter believes. “Therefore, regardless of what individual experts and former diplomats in the States consider, there are no options for improving relations.”
He drew attention to the fact that the United States systematically mentions Russia in the light of “interference with the elections” and speaks of the threat posed by it. At the same time, Moscow has a more constructive position, Bruter noted.
“Russia does not speak about the American threat outside of specific situations and outside of specific US actions. Russia, on the contrary, always says that it is ready to cooperate constructively, despite disagreements, ”the expert summed up.