Carnegie Moscow Center
A broad array of military, political, and legal issues exert an increasing influence on the issue of nuclear nonproliferation, and they must be taken into account in any effort to strengthen the nonproliferation regime.
The Obama administration’s decision to abandon plans to deploy a European ballistic missile defense system has helped sooth relations with Russia and provided an opportunity for U.S.-Russian cooperation on missile defense.
The Obama administration must engage in a new type of dialogue with the Middle East, one modeled after the process used to improve relations with the Soviet bloc, if it wants to have any chance of impacting political reform in the region.
By pursuing its own distinct foreign policy, Russia is isolating itself from the rest of the world. A continuation of these policies will leave Russia with only weak, opportunistic ties to the global community.
Minimizing the environmental impact of climate change and resource development in the Arctic must be a top priority, if environmental disaster is to be avoided.
The European Union has little direct governmental influence on Russia, but its indirect societal influence is significant. Ultimately, however, while the EU can help efforts to modernize Russia, there is a need for real reform from inside the country itself.
Russia must aim for modernization and use its foreign policy to achieve rapprochement with Europe, North America and the economically and politically developed world at large.
Successive U.S. administrations have forfeited the chance to integrate Russia into the West first afforded by the collapse of Communism and again by 9/11. The United States has either neglected Russia or openly disregarded its overtures and warnings on a range of regional concerns. President-elect Obama needs a comprehensive approach to Russia based on a shared vision of European security.
The crisis in Georgia bluntly revealed the failure by the United States and Russia to create a closer working relationship after the Cold War. Agreements like the START and Concentional Armed Forces in Europe treaties could help establish a new book of rules both countries can embrace.
Disarmament cooperation between Russia and the U.S. has stalled. Negotiations must be renewed, for inaction could revive an arms race.