THE AFGHANISTAN QUESTION AND THE RESET IN U.S.-RUSSIAN RELATIONS

U.S. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates has said
that the ability of the United States and Russia to cooperate
in Afghanistan will be a solid test of their reset
in relations. That proposition is the thesis of this
monograph. Many analysts in both countries would
agree with this assessment, but a significant number
of them believe a fruitful reset is implausible.
American skeptics argue that under Vladimir Putin,
Russia has reversed the timid efforts that Boris
Yeltsin embraced to safeguard political pluralism in
Russia. But in addition to the awesome value gap that
compromises cooperation, Russia has demonstrated
that it favors confrontation and not cooperation with
the West; witness the 2008 Russia-Georgian War.
From the Russian perspective, one finds similar arguments
against cooperation. For example, the Americans
are looking to exit from a military engagement
that is not going well for them, and all metrics suggest
things will get worse instead of better. Why, then,
should Russia become involved in a lost cause? The
Americans want Russia’s help because the U.S. population
has turned against the war in Afghanistan and
in 2012 most European troops will leave Afghanistan.
Without discounting the many roadblocks, leaders
in both countries believe that even limited security cooperation
is in their vital interest. In this connection, both Washington and Moscow deem a return of the
Taliban in Afghanistan as detrimental to their respective
security priorities.