Getting Russia Right – Misconceptions about Russia and its Impact on US Policy

Introduction

A thorough study of the United States’ repeated policy failures in dealing with Russia, its aims, and capabilities is long needed. Russia is commonly seen as a global expansionist power intent on sweeping away the world’s democracies and establishing a new global order based on illiberal principles and rules devised by the US’ two authoritarian great power rivals. However, it is frequently dismissed as a deteriorating, possibly terminal state.

It is necessary to have a more comprehensive grasp of Russia’s geopolitical aims and capabilities. This issue is mostly a result of three factors and all of these continue to influence how policymakers approach a tense relationship with Moscow today. By deconstructing the analytical assumptions that underpin these misunderstandings, President Joe Biden’s administration and other key policymakers will be better positioned to ensure that future US policy is based on the most realistic understanding of the challenge Russia poses and the appropriate tools the US should employ to address it.

The Factors Responsible for the Misconceptions

The first factor is the post-Cold War euphoria that still exists. For many Western observers, the fall of the Soviet Union and the subsequent decline of Russian strength revealed the United States’ unquestionable dominance. It was difficult to understand Moscow’s pushback against Western policies because of the assumption that Russia’s decline was so profound and irrevocable that it would no longer be able to oppose them. This was especially problematic during the 1990s and early 2000s when the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) conducted three rounds of enlargement under US leadership. Leaders in the United States overlooked Russia’s complaints and underestimated the lengths to which their Russian counterparts were willing to go to protect their homeland from perceived dangers.

A New Cold War? Why the U.S. and China Would Both Lose - Knowledge@Wharton — *The first factor is the post-Cold War euphoria that still exists.*

Secondly, American officials and experts have long paid insufficient attention to the factors that influence Russia’s foreign policy. Russian threat views are impacted by geography and a long history of tumultuous ties with other major European powers. They are exacerbated by the trauma of losing its empire, the lingering greatness ideology, and a sense of entitlement based on its World War II effort. All of them are stoked by President Vladimir Putin for domestic political gain.

Thirdly, the lessons learned from the two most critical Cold War crises—the 1962 Cuban missile crisis and the early 1980s Euromissile crisis—have not been effectively digested by US leaders. In both cases, the Soviet Union went to great lengths to counter what its officials viewed as an unacceptably unilateral US threat to the Soviet Motherland. In 1962, they were on the verge of starting a nuclear war and In 1987, they agreed to eliminate an entire class of intermediate-range nuclear weapons in order to defend the country from US missiles.

In the event of a conflict, US missiles stationed in Europe would deny the Kremlin of strategic depth and decision time. The lessons of earlier crises were discarded as anachronisms when NATO began its eastward expansion on the assumption that it would no longer need to worry about, let alone retain, the needed capabilities for the territory defence duty. After all, Russia has always been a vulnerable country. When Russia demonstrated differently, the coalition was caught off guard.

Unboxing the Difficulty of Russia’s Foreign Policy Activism

Russian foreign policy has become more assertive, confrontational, and ambitious over the last decade, which has come as a surprise to the US and its allies. Russia has used a diversified toolkit rich in hard, soft, and grey zone power weapons to assert itself as a global power in the post-Soviet area, the Middle East, Latin America, and portions of Africa. Russian foreign policy, dexterity, and even audacity have often caught the West off-guard, raising fears of a comeback of Russia as a serious threat to Western interests. In actuality, the Russian gains and tools utilised to achieve Moscow’s goals have been underwhelming. Russia has made up for it by profiting from the mistakes of the US and its allies, or by filling power vacuums left by them.

The 'roller coaster' relationship between US, Russia - News @ Northeastern — *Russian foreign policy has become more assertive, confrontational, and ambitious over the last decade, which has come as a surprise to the US and its allies.*

Nonetheless, Russian muscle-flexing and agility in deploying its toolkit, which will undoubtedly be supplemented as new and even more disruptive technologies become available, will remain a top-tier issue for the president and his senior national security advisers. Russia will remain a serious national security concern for the United States due to its nuclear arsenal, conventional, and cyber capabilities, as well as the United States’ commitment to NATO, which is locked in a tense standoff with Russia, in close proximity to its heartland, for the foreseeable future.

The alternative of misreading Russia—assessing its capabilities and intents, the long-term drivers of its policy and threat perceptions, as well as its accomplishments—is a prescription for squandered resources, altered national goals, and heightened danger of confrontation.

Setting priorities and distinguishing between primary and secondary interests are critical in responding to this situation. The main stage of the East-West struggle is Europe, where Russian actions pose a threat to Western security. Russia’s advancements outside of Europe have been significantly less than widely portrayed, and it poses a lot less serious danger to US interests.

Conclusion

The US’s continuous dismissal of Russia as a “has been” or declining power whose bark will always be worse than its bite might lead to the US overextending itself, making unrealistic commitments, and risking a deadly escalation with the one nuclear peer competitor it still has. The effort to expand NATO without considering the potential of Russia resurfacing as a significant military power is an example of this type of thinking that should be avoided in the future.

Simultaneously, the scope and scale of the threat that Russia’s global engagement poses to US interests will be largely determined by how Washington interprets those interests in places where Russia has increased its influence over the last decade. Without a realistic appraisal of Russia’s advantages and weapons for power projection, the US will unnecessarily pursue the spectre of Russian expansionism in far-flung corners of the globe where significant US interests are not at risk.