Ukraine will remain at the heart of the conflict between the U.S. and
Russia beyond the 2016 presidential election.
In the polls, Americans
are united on Ukraine; The majority of respondents support increased
sanctions on the Kremlin. All of the major presidential candidates, save Senator
Rand Paul, take a tough approach with Moscow and support arming Ukraine.
Take Hillary Clinton, the presumed nominee for
the Democratic Party. She is not Moscow's favorite, to say the least. The
Russian media accuses her of mortal sins: toughness, feminism, political
correctness and a pedantic disposition. In 2014, Russian President Vladimir
Putin attacked her ad hominem in an interview with French journalists.
"It's better not to argue with women," Putin
said. "But Ms. Clinton has never been too graceful in her
statements....When people push boundaries too far, it's not because they are
strong but because they are weak. But maybe weakness is not the worst quality
for a woman."
The Clintons' foreign affairs circle is tough on
Russia. It included the lateRichard
Holbrooke, the architect of the partition of Yugoslavia, who was no softie on
Russia. Victoria Nuland, assistant
secretary of state for European affairs, who gave out cookies on the Maidan
during the anti-Yanukovych demonstrations and who since has been demonized by
the Russians for her outspoken support for Ukraine's independence, is a member.
It also countsAlexander
Vershbow, the current deputy secretary general of NATO and a former U.S. ambassador
to Russia.
As secretary of state, Clinton talked tough to
European leaders about the conflict in eastern Ukraine and her attitude toward
Putin was firm. Boris
Johnson, the mayor of London, said that he was
struck by the persistence with which she spoke about how Europe must
confront the Russian president.
"Her general anxiety was that Putin, if
unchallenged and unchecked, would continue to expand his influence in the
perimeter of what was the Soviet Union," Johnson
said.
Clinton told Johnson that Britons should be less dependent on Russian
hydrocarbons and that they must seek alternative sources of energy.
How to confront the Russian enigma is not a new
subject for Clinton. In her memoir Hard
Choices she writes, "For many years I have spent a lot of time thinking
about how to understand Putin."
Clinton's
last memo as secretary of state in January 2013 warned President Barack Obama
about Putin's ambitions. She assessed Putin as a threat "to his neighbors
and the global order," cautioning that "difficult days lay ahead and
that our relationship with Moscow would likely get worse before it got
better."
Clinton encouraged Obama to push the pause button on the "reset"
policy that she and the president had launched in 2009. She cautioned,
"Don't appear too eager to work together. Don't flatter Putin with
high-level attention.… Strength and resolve were the only language Putin would
understand."
The president ignored her advice initially,
accepting Putin's invitation for a presidential-level summit in Moscow in the
summer of 2013. The visit was canceled after the Kremlin gave asylum to the
defector Edward Snowden. In
Clinton's opinion, Putin is "reclaiming the Soviet Empire and crushing domestic
dissent."
It will not be any easier for the Kremlin with
the Republicans. Governor Jeb Bush has
not officially announced his candidacy, but he is
known to criticize "naïveté" and "passivity" in foreign
policy, including on Ukraine and Russia. His brother, former President George
W. Bush, has little enthusiasm when it comes to Putin.
Jeb Bush's foreign policy team is likely to include key players from his
brother's team, including former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and former
Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, hardly Kremlin favorites.
If not Bush, then who? The anti-communist Cuban-American senators Marco
Rubio and Ted Cruz, both members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee,
support lethal aid to Ukraine and have sharply criticized Russia. Rubio and
Cruz idolize Ronald Reagan and his policies of peace through strength. Cruz
said that the U.S. has an "obligation" to arm Ukraine, much to
Moscow's chagrin.
Another candidate for the Republican presidential nomination is Wisconsin
Governor Scott Walker, who also favors arming Ukraine.
The odd man out is Senator Rand Paul. One Forbes commentator noted thatPaul
has been all over the map on Ukraine and some of his
statements tend to contradict previous ones. His Russia advisers are Ambassador
Richard Burtand Dimitri Simes, president
of the Center for the National Interest. These foreign policy realists support
warmer relations with Russia.
Thus, short of a surprising Paul victory in 2016, Russia is facing a united
front of Republican and Democratic candidates who all support the restoration
of Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity. Until then, sanctions are
unlikely to disappear.
Putin's nationally televised four-hour call-in
show on April 16 showed his stiff upper lip and defiance against the U.S.,
but the reality of isolation and sanctions over Ukraine will take their toll.
However, there are no easy outs for Moscow—either from Republicans or
Democrats. On Ukraine, Americans are united.
Ariel Cohen, Ph.D., is
director of the Center for Energy, Natural Resources and Geopolitics at
the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security and
principal of International
Market Analysis, Ltd. This
article first appeared on
the Atlantic Council site.
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