As Vladimir Putin recently put it, the planned "reset" in relations between Russia and the West has not happened; if anything, Washington should "step on the brake hard" to prevent the relationship from deteriorating any further. While Russia welcomed the Obama administration's recent overtures, the expulsion at the end of April of two Russian diplomats from Brussels over spying allegations was perceived by Moscow as a signal "in a different direction."
The same perception was elicited by the military exercises that the NATO Alliance has been holding this May in Georgia. Russia reacted by expelling two NATO diplomats and reaching a border deal with South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The agreement, which will allow Russian border guards to patrol those region's borders with Georgia, was interpreted in the West as an indication that Moscow could be preparing to settle scores with Tbilisi when it suits its agenda.
These events remind the NATO allies that relations with Russia continue to represent one of the key areas to assess the alliance's vitality and prospective longevity. Sixty years after the signing of the Washington treaty, the reality is very different from the late 1940s. Unlike during the heydays of the Cold War, when NATO's raison d'être was to keep the United States in, the Russians out, and the Germans down following the disintegration of the Soviet threat, this alliance's dynamic of American leadership, Russian exclusion, and European complacency has become outdated.
By contrast, in the post-Cold War international system, behind official declarations of unity and cohesion, the members of the alliance have displayed worryingly different perceptions of Russia. On the one side, NATO's 'old' European members, namely Germany, Italy, and France, being nearer to Russia and heavily dependent upon Moscow's gas and energy supplies, are not enthusiastic about the prospect of new tension with Moscow.
On the other side, the Alliance's new Eastern European recruits and aspirant members, feeling threatened by Russia's newly assertive nationalism, invoke NATO's solidarity and assistance. US and British perceptions tend to concur with those of the new east European allies and prospective NATO members, which since the early 1990s knock on the Alliance's door in search of protection against the risk of resurgent and hard-nosed Russian nationalism.
While the Alliance's eastern expansion has been framed in liberal-democratic terms and on occasions NATO has been portrayed as a ‘security community' or a ‘European peace movement', realist students of international relations were quick in realizing that Russia was likely to react to the Alliance's enlargement, digging in its heels and, if needed, resorting to force. They advised NATO leaders to draw a red line for Moscow with regard to manipulating the situation in the former Soviet space but also to engage the Russians in a constructive dialogue.
However, although the members of the Alliance have taken steps to reassure Russia, as a result of their diverging national interests, they have been unwilling to offer marriage. Cohabitation arrangements, such as the NATO-Russia Council, have served useful functions, without offering a satisfactory long-term solution.
Therefore, the Kremlin has continued to view relations with NATO as a ‘zero-sum' game and to perceive the Alliance's eastern enlargement as a part of a US grand strategy aimed at besieging Russia from the Baltic to the Black Sea. After the admission of the Baltic states in 2004, the Bush administration's attempt to absorb Ukraine and Georgia into the Alliance through the Membership Action Plan provided the Russian leadership with a pretext to increase pressure on former Soviet republics and break away from the perceived feeling of encirclement.
Solving the puzzle in NATO-Russia relations will require to forge a new, broader, realist approach to Moscow. Meanwhile, the Kremlin's preferred option hardly differs from Soviet Cold War preferences and remains the creation of a different, new pan-European organization which would incorporate the Russian Federation as a full member, but would clearly undermine the transatlantic elements of European security and the structure of Euro-Atlantic relations.
While the US and its European allies shall not be enticed by Russian mermaids, if Moscow's inclusion into the Alliance does not deserve serious consideration, ceasing to insist that NATO membership is open to all may constitute a first and wise step in the right direction: only then would the Alliance have the chance of another sixty successful years of thriving existence.
A longer version of this article will be published in the Spring/Summer 2009 issue of the International Journal.
Dr Luca Ratti teaches international relations at Roma Tre University and the American University of Rome.
Related Materials from the Atlantic Community:
- Heiko Pääbo: Russia Should See NATO as Friend Not Foe
- Karsten Voigt: The Next Steps for NATO
- Olaf Theiler: Cohesion Vital for NATO's Future
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June 24, 2009
Radoslaw Kowalski, University of Edinburgh, (4)
Unfortunately, Russia will never join NATO because the ambition of Russian leaders is to create a discrete civilisation, and a Moscov consensus. Russian key politicians, in a way a bit similar to leaders of pre-WW1 Germany, are surrounded by nationalist advisers, so their vision of the world is a picture crammed with a plethora of dangers (be it real or imagined from our point of view).
EU and US politicians talk to a partner who does not want to talk, really. Although talking about Russia's membership in NATO is a purely wishful thinking, it's useful in a way that we inform Russians that we not all that evil (as they show us in their propaganda).
Very interesting is the effect of 'the threat of eastward NATO enlargement' as perceived by Russia.
Russia seeking more control over the former soviet republics surrounding it, makes an even more benign neigbor from itself for those republics. Russia becomes increasingly alienated, despite superficial declarations of subservience from those countries.
In my opinion, this prepares the ground for fierce nationalism in those republics, just like in case of Georgia. Russia's leadership is preparing an even more unbareable situation for itself, both at home and abroad. Take recent developments in Ingushetia as an example, as well.
Looking at the situation from a realist stance, I would also say that the little winners of the situation are the nationalists from former soviet republics while the greatest looser is, as oftentimes, Russia. Russian political leaders continuously confirm and remind all of its neighbors that the relations with Russia are always of resistance, fight and oppression and cannot be normal - peaceful for the mutual benefit.
Russia specializes in solutions bad for everyone, even for its own citizens who are the greatest loosers of the game, and the most indifferent of all as well.