Spring Break
America's aggressive policies toward Russia must end
Ali Mirza
Issue date: 4/13/09 Section: Commentary
In the wake of nearly a decade of disastrous foreign policy, the United States finds itself faced with many challenges from outside its borders. Of the many blunders committed by the Bush Administration in terms of U.S. foreign policy, perhaps one in particular has been considerably downplayed: the trend of increasing antagonism toward the Russian Federation.
From the U.S.'s unilateral withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002, to the prospect of a "missile defense shield" in Poland and the Czech Republic that would essentially give the U.S. nuclear first-strike primacy, one fact is clear: the Russians feel as though they are under increasing U.S. strategic pressure in what they see as a U.S. attempt to undermine their regional position.
Arguably the central vehicle of this process has been the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and its consistent expansion since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Formed in the wake of World War II and the subsequent Cold War, NATO served as a collective of states whose obligation was to come to the mutual defense of a member state under attack or threat by an external party. However, in light of the circumstances from which NATO emerged, perhaps its true strategic purpose was best espoused by its first Secretary General, Lord Ismay, who candidly stated that the organization's goal was "to keep the Russians out, the Americans in, and the Germans down."
With the demise of the Soviet Union in 1991, and with it NATO's counterweight, the Warsaw Pact, the future of NATO came into question. For an organization whose purpose was predicated upon checking the perpetual threat of a communist superpower (the Soviet Union), what was to become of it now that the communists had fallen?
At least for the Russians, the message from Washington in the wake of the Soviet Union's collapse was that NATO was not going to expand. In fact, this is exactly what former president George H.W. Bush and his secretary of State James Baker promised Mikhail Gorbachev in February of 1990, when he was told NATO would not "move eastward."
From the U.S.'s unilateral withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002, to the prospect of a "missile defense shield" in Poland and the Czech Republic that would essentially give the U.S. nuclear first-strike primacy, one fact is clear: the Russians feel as though they are under increasing U.S. strategic pressure in what they see as a U.S. attempt to undermine their regional position.
Arguably the central vehicle of this process has been the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and its consistent expansion since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Formed in the wake of World War II and the subsequent Cold War, NATO served as a collective of states whose obligation was to come to the mutual defense of a member state under attack or threat by an external party. However, in light of the circumstances from which NATO emerged, perhaps its true strategic purpose was best espoused by its first Secretary General, Lord Ismay, who candidly stated that the organization's goal was "to keep the Russians out, the Americans in, and the Germans down."
With the demise of the Soviet Union in 1991, and with it NATO's counterweight, the Warsaw Pact, the future of NATO came into question. For an organization whose purpose was predicated upon checking the perpetual threat of a communist superpower (the Soviet Union), what was to become of it now that the communists had fallen?
At least for the Russians, the message from Washington in the wake of the Soviet Union's collapse was that NATO was not going to expand. In fact, this is exactly what former president George H.W. Bush and his secretary of State James Baker promised Mikhail Gorbachev in February of 1990, when he was told NATO would not "move eastward."
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