In the past two decades, much of the debate in the United States and Europe has been focused on how to deal with Russia and the so-called resumption of relations with that country. The policy of resuming relations in the Obama administration, the EU-Russia modernization partnership, the German Mosberg initiative, or the EU\u2019s proposals for selective engagement with Russia have been among the initiatives to start talks with Russia in recent years.<\/p>\n
Challenges between the West and Russia<\/strong><\/p>\n During Putin\u2019s presidency, Russia has become a centralized state and has returned to its traditional global position. It has also competed with the United States to strengthen its influence in various fields. Despite its economic weakness, Moscow has been able to intervene in various parts of the world and challenge Western interests. Russia\u2019s relations with the West have been peaceful only at two junctures in recent years: first, the events of 9\/11 and Russian aid to the United States in the war in Afghanistan; and the second juncture was between 2008-2012 during Medvedev\u2019s presidency and the policy of resumption of relations during the Obama administration, when the West and Russia cooperated in areas such as arms control, Afghanistan and Iran; but with Putin returning to the Kremlin in 2012, tensions between the West and Russia resumed once again. Russia initially accused the West of being the main culprit in the 2012 anti-Putin protests. Granting asylum to Edward Snowden was another important factor in escalating tensions. Meanwhile, the escape of Ukrainian President Yanukovych and the subsequent entry of Russian troops into the Crimean peninsula (a violation of the 1994 Budapest Accord) caused tensions in the relations between the two sides. Since spring of 2014, Russia and Ukraine have been embroiled in a war in Donbas in which more than 14,000 people have lost their lives. Moscow\u2019s involvement in the Syrian crisis has also raised tensions between Russia and the West. Another example of such tensions was the accusation of Russian cyber-interference in the 2016 US presidential election, in which Russia used social media to intensify the polarized US political climate. Russia\u2019s actions against some of its citizens on the European soil or the imprisonment of Alexei Navalny also indicate a significant difference between Russia\u2019s and the West\u2019s perception of human rights issues.<\/p>\n West and Russia trying to undermine each other<\/strong><\/p>\n In the years of the first decade of the third millennium, Russia sought to restore its position on the world stage by increasing energy prices, economic growth and modernization, and by building powerful state-owned companies worldwide in the field of selling strategic resource, and was using political influence in this regard. However, since the beginning of the second decade of this millennium, there has been a fundamental shift in Moscow\u2019s policies. Given the disappeared hopes for economic modernization and the weakening of Russia\u2019s economy, the path to power through economic growth was eroded, and in fact the path to power recovery through the enhancement of domestic capabilities was replaced by the weakening of geopolitical rivals. Arrests of political opponents, financial support for European populist parties, hybrid warfare and misinformation, and in some cases support for specific political forces, have been among Russia\u2019s policies.<\/p>\n In contrast, Western countries did not seek to weaken Russia in the 1990s and the first decade of the third millennium. Although it was in the interests of Europe and the United States that the Russian Federation not to remain as powerful as in Soviet times, they never wanted a big country like Russia to go bankrupt with nuclear weapons, thus upsetting all geopolitical balances. Although the European Union and Russia even launched the \u201cPartnership for Modernization\u201d program due to the Obama administration\u2019s policy of resuming relations, the Ukraine-Crimea crisis was the end of the resumption strategy. Following such developments, the imposition of economic sanctions aimed at isolating Russia became part of the Western agenda. Western experts warn that mutual weakening strategies between the West and Russia have weakened both sides, and that the rise of populists in the United States and the European Union has undermined the West\u2019s credibility, cohesion and capabilities. On the other hand, Russia\u2019s resources and its economic future have also fallen victim to Moscow\u2019s military and political targets.<\/p>\n Concluding remarks<\/strong><\/p>\n In recent years, the war in Georgia in 2008, the annexation of Crimea and the start of the Ukraine war in 2014 have shaken Russia\u2019s position as a strategic partner and made Moscow a very important strategic challenge for the West. Russia has now been able to maintain its global credibility due to its traditional advantages of nuclear weapons, geographical size, military might, and permanent membership in the Security Council (despite economic difficulties). Of course, there are also differences among European countries over the type of interaction with Russia. While the historical experiences of the Baltic States and former countries of the Warsaw Pact have raised serious concerns for EU about Russia, larger countries such as France and Germany are seeking economic engagement with Russia.<\/p>\n It can be said that after years of declining relations, the sanctions, diplomatic reprisal and escalation of information war has put relations between the two sides at their lowest level since the end of the Cold War. There is a growing feeling among Russian leaders that the fragile relations between the West and the East have reached an irreversible point, and that Moscow must abandon the hope for reconciliation with the West and look for lasting alternatives; including intensive strengthening of relations with China and establishment of purposeful relations with some European countries and other regions that are interested in doing business with Moscow. It seems that this competition will end only when one side of the story comes to the conclusion that it is losing this endless competition.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Strategic Council Online – Opinion: After the collapse of the Soviet Union, many in the West thought that the Russians were interested in joining the Western world and would become more like Europeans and Americans, but it soon became clear that centuries of Russian history has given shape to a distinct and unique understanding of the position of that country in the world. Moscow now considers its security zone not the borders of the Russian Federation, but the borders of the Soviet Union, and demands that the United States and Europe accept it.
\nAlireza Thamoudi -Expert on Europe Affairs<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":137845,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[13268,17,12726],"tags":[24746,21658,12869,31405,16275,13070,31404,31403,20330],"class_list":["post-137862","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-note","category-politics","category-10-en-2","tag-alexei-navalny","tag-alireza-thamoudi","tag-china-en","tag-european-populist-parties","tag-putin","tag-russia-en","tag-ukraine-war","tag-warsaw-pact","tag-west"],"yoast_head":"\n