The road to Moscow.

• Author: Hart, Gary
• Position: The Realist - United States and Russia foreign relations

The Obama administration's initial steps to reset relations with Russia are welcome news. Few countries are as important to America's national interests, and few relationships have been as badly managed by U.S. officials.

The efforts were substantively launched at Barack Obama's London meeting with Russian President Dmitri Medvedev in April, and set a positive tone. But the "fresh start" the two sides have called for will not be easy and meaningful improvement will be even harder. Both sides have accumulated considerable baggage, political and psychological alike, and there are reasons for the sharp deterioration in ties between Washington and Moscow. To begin, while the United States and Russia have very different political processes, influential voices in both countries argue against the steps that would make true cooperation possible.

In the United States, some have foreclosed attempts to work with Russia because it has not become a full-fledged capitalist democracy on the American model quickly enough, the rule of law is too slow in taking root, Moscow is not living up to our norms of human rights, elections are rigged, the media suppressed, economic transactions are not transparent and the list goes on. The question is: are these arguments of sufficient weight to justify resistance to closer U.S.-Russian coordination on issues of strong mutual interest?

An even-more complex question is whether there is innate resistance within the American foreign-policy community to an improved relationship with Russia. Are we holding the Russians to a higher standard of performance than we do other nations with whom we deal?

And, if so, why? The continued existence of the Jackson-Vanik amendment--which withheld trade benefits in an effort to force the Soviet Union to allow freer emigration--almost two decades after Communism's collapse seems to be proof positive. The amendment has in the past been circumvented for both China and Vietnam, not to mention former--Soviet republics Ukraine and Georgia, the latter of which in particular is hardly a model democracy. There has not yet been a satisfactory explanation for its statutory persistence with regard to Russia.

If Russia were not a major power, possessing nuclear weapons, a veto in the United Nations Security Council, huge energy resources and a major presence in the post-Soviet space, one could make a case that having distant relations with Moscow is not so terrible. But in practical terms, we...