AP Photo / Evan Vucci FilePresident Barack Obama meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Enniskillen, Northern Ireland on June 17, 2013. Obama has cancelled plans to meet with Putin in Moscow next month — a rare diplomatic snub.The move is retribution for Russia's decision to grant temporary asylum to Edward Snowden.
ANALYSIS
President Barack Obama is giving Russian leader Vladimir Putin the cold shoulder, but does it herald a return to the Cold War?
On Wednesday, the Obama administration announced that the president would not meet Mr. Putin on the sidelines of the G20 summit next month in St. Petersburg, Russia, as was expected.
The snub follows on the heels of Russia granting secrets leaker Edward Snowden asylum. Mr. Obama said he was “disappointed” by the move to grant Mr. Snowden asylum for one year and said it reflects the “underlying challenges” the U.S. faces in dealing with Moscow.
There have been times where they slip back into Cold War thinking and a Cold War mentality
“There have been times where they slip back into Cold War thinking and a Cold War mentality,” Mr. Obama said on NBC’s The Tonight Show.
Ben Rhodes, the White House deputy national security advisor, said Russia’s decision to defy the U.S. worsened an already troubled relationship. And with few signs that progress would be made during the Moscow summit on other agenda items, Mr. Rhodes said the president decided to cancel the talks.
“We’ll still work with Russia on issues where we can find common ground, but it was the unanimous view of the president and his national security team that a summit did not make sense in the current environment,” Mr. Rhodes said.
(AP Photo / Tatyana Lokshina, Human Rights Watch, fileNSA leaker Edward Snowden has been granted temporary asylum in Russia.
Mark Kramer, director of Cold War Studies at Harvard University, said relations between the two countries were at their lowest since 1999 and the Kosovo war.
“But that’s a far cry from saying it’s a cold war,” said Mr. Kramer. He said the Cold War was a time when the U.S. and Russia were “two countries that were fundamentally divided along ideological lines as well as militarily, politically and other issues. That’s not the case here. Russia simply isn’t the overwhelming powerful country the Soviet Union was.”
Mr. Kramer said the deteriorating relationship showed the failure of Mr. Obama’s much-touted “reset” with the Russians.
“What it does illustrate is that the so-called reset the Obama administration was so proud of has been a colossal failure. Basically we are back to 14 years ago and that does not speak well to the administration’s dealing with Russia,” said Mr. Kramer.
AP Photo/APTNIn this image taken from Associated Press Television shows, Russian lawyer Anatoly Kucherena showing a temporary document to allow Edward Snowden to cross the border into Russia while speaking to the media after visiting National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden at Sheremetyevo airport outside Moscow, Russia, on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2013.
He said the Snowden affair was a “slap in the face” to Mr. Obama and under the circumstances he was wise not to meet Mr. Putin.
Walter Connor, professor of international relations at Boston University, said a major part of the problem with U.S.-Russia relations was Mr. Putin’s anti-Americanism and his desire to present Russia as a great power.
The Cold War was about a rivalry, about dominating the world in a sense, and this is not what’s at stake in U.S.-Russia relationships anymore and hasn’t been since the end of the Soviet Union
“This is a situation largely of Putin’s own making,” said Mr. Connor. “There is a tendency on the part of his crew and himself to place a kind of tough rivalry with the United States as a critical part of the general orientation of foreign policy, and it’s no longer a matter of two superpowers balancing each other.”
He said a “hard-minded, tough, unflinching” Russian leader might be able to get certain benefits in relations with the U.S. but added, “It has been pushed a bit too far.”
“He has chosen to be a sort of hard guy, a tough guy,” said Mr. Connor and that decision was complicating the relationship.
AP Photo / Russia24 via Associated Press TelevisionIn this still image taken on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2013 and released by Russia24 TV channel, shows Russian lawyer Anatoly Kucherena, second right in the center, and National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden, center back to a camera, as Snowden leaves Sheremetyevo airport outside Moscow, Russia, on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2013
“The Cold War was about a rivalry, about dominating the world in a sense, and this is not what’s at stake in U.S.-Russia relationships anymore and hasn’t been since the end of the Soviet Union. Which side, U.S. or Russia, has had the bigger problem adjusting to this? Well it’s been Russia and Putin.”
In Moscow, the Kremlin expressed its disappointment over the cancelled meeting but said it remains ready to work with the United States on a variety of issues. Mr. Putin’s foreign affairs advisor, Yuri Ushakov, told reporters the move reflected the inability of the U.S. to develop relations with Moscow on an “equal basis.”
The two countries have frequently found themselves at odds on pressing international issues, most recently in Syria, where the U.S. accuses Mr. Putin of helping President Bashar al-Assad fund a civil war. The U.S. has also been a vocal critic of Russia’s crackdown on Kremlin critics and recently sanctioned 18 Russians for human rights violations.
Moscow has accused the U.S. of installing a missile shield in Eastern Europe as a deterrent against Russia, despite American assurances that the shield is not aimed at its former Cold War foe. Mr. Putin also signed a law last year banning U.S. adoptions of Russian children, a move that was seen as retaliation for the U.S. measure that cleared the way for the human rights sanctions.
Some congressional lawmakers have called for Mr. Obama to demand that Russia forfeit its right to host the G20 summit. Others have spoken of boycotting next year’s Winter Olympics in the Russian city of Sochi.
Sen. Chuck Schumer said Wednesday that “Putin doesn’t deserve the respect after what he’s done with Snowden.” He told CNN, “I know what he’s doing. He’s trying to make Russia a big power again. To show him the respect at the bilateral talks doesn’t make sense.”
National Post, with files from The Associated Press
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