Russia, Post‐Communist Europe, and the Geopolitics of Eurasia

Abstract

In the first decade of the twenty-first century, due to impressive economic growth on the back of high energy prices, Russia has begun to reassert itself in international politics. In the last decade of the twentieth century, Russia was bereft: it had lost an empire, its sphere of influence, and with the collapse of communism its sense of identity. The once proud superpower was at that time confronted with an economy in freefall, a decaying military, a demographic crisis (life-expectancy tumbled to levels found in some poor third-world countries), and an uncertain place in world affairs. Russia's first post-Soviet, post Communist president, Boris Yeltsin, had sought to move the country closer to the West. His successor in 2000, Vladimir Putin, at first continued with this trend. However, differences on a number of important issues prevented this initial goal being reached. Russia and the United States have asymmetrical interests or serious conflicting views over a number of issues that are largely centered in Europe: the expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), especially plans for further expansion to include Ukraine and Georgia; U.S. designs for national missile defense systems in Poland and the Czech Republic; Western support for the color revolutions in the post-Soviet territories; gas and oil pipeline routes; and the question of independence for Kosovo. This all came to a head with the short Russo-Georgian war in August 2008, and the subsequent increase in tensions between Moscow and Washington. There are also differences between Russia and the United States over how to deal with some problems in the Middle East, including the Iraq War, sanctions against Iran, and the status that Hamas should be accorded in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Some see tensions giving rise to a new Cold War.