Hans Ulrich Klose, a member of the Atlantic Initiative's Advisory Board and of the German parliament for the Social Democratic Party spoke to the Atlantic Community's partner organization World Security Network:
The Atlantic Community editorial team summarized his main arguments from the above video interview:
In the United States after the Cold War there was a general sense that the US was the only superpower left, and that they would deal with world problems as they saw fit. The feeling of inferiority which developed in Russia has led to the current situation where Russia is doing everything that it can to reemerge as a major world player.
The second major Western mistake vis-à-vis Russia was that many people expected Russia to be a perfect democracy within 10 to 15 years, an unrealistic time scale given Russia's undemocratic history. Today, Russia has significant destructive power and it is in fact very difficult to make any progress on issues such as Afghanistan, Iran, and Kosovo without Russia.
A realistic analysis of the situation calls for a different approach from Americans than from Europeans. In Europe, Russia is a neighbor and the European security architecture thus needs to include Russia. Russia is also essential for European energy supplies. Europeans should therefore cooperate with the Russians, but the difficulties which exist should not be denied.
Rather than public finger pointing, eye-to-eye discussions should guide the European approach. America should accept this and perhaps follow the European example as well.
Hans-Ulrich Klose is a member of the Atlantic Initiative's Advisory Board, member of the German parliament for the Social Democratic Party, and deputy chairman of the foreign relations committee
This video interview was conducted by the Atlantic Community's partner organization, the World Security Network.
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April 23, 2008
Lukas Vitalijus, Institute for European Studies, University of British Columbia, Silver Contributor (54)
Mr. Hans-Ulrich Klose is certainly right pointing out that a mood after the Cold War and today with regards to Russia has changed dramatically. In fact, it many respects it turned 360 degrees.
There are many reasons why Russia and 'the West' (or Western part of Europe) has not become true partners during this period (but note that neither both has become each others foe): history, national identity, power (and the lack of it), etc. However, there is still one more factor that gets less attention but is of great importance: honesty.
Mr. Hans-Ulrich Klose is also right that public finger pointing is not very helpful (after all, human-rights and democracy have never been the strongest part of Russia anyways, according to many and including Mr. H.U. Klose himself), but an open eye-to-eye discussion is hardly gonna help either (and Europeans are not particular good on being able to be open with the Russians either) The reason is simple: there is no open discussion. There is official statements, official hand-shakes, official energy deals, etc. What is missing is a genuine dialog. Critics would say that there certainly is one or at least used to be. again on official level, of course. Maybe it is a time to refresh our minds and remember that dialog really means?
A dialog is a reciprocal conversation between two or more entities.
With this in mind, how reciprocal conversation the Russians and the Westerner s are having?
One can only hope, that this time useful comments by Mr. Hans-Ulrich Klose will be heard, finally.