Russia’s modern foreign and security policy is a qualitatively new phenomenon with only marginal resemblance to the policies of Tsarist Russia and those of the Soviet Union. This new phenomenon defies attempts to draw historic parallels which, although intellectually tempting and appealing, often represent mere simplifications or politically motivated distortions of today’s Russia behavior, motives, and goals.

Because of fundamentals linked to Russia’s geopolitical situation, some elements of this policy may appear as traditional, stemming from a distant or not so distant past. However, the dramatic changes in Russia’s political regime, its international posture, its relationship with the West and its self-perception produced deep shifts in the character of Russia’s foreign and security policy.

Besides, modern Russia faces new external and internal security and political challenges of an unprecedented nature, as well as new limits to the exercise of its influence and control. All these shifts dictate new approaches to Russia’s security and foreign policy issues.

Four key factors determine today’s Russia new security setting: the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact, the fall of the Soviet Union of which Russia was the center and the main part, the death of the Communist political system, and the end of the confrontation with the West. All this drastically changed Russia’s self-perception. It evolved from that of being the main adversary of the united West and first of all the United States, to an image of a partner or even of a potential ally of the United States.

Having backed off from Cold War policies, Moscow logically severed its ties with the remaining anti-American and Communist regimes that used to be its best friends, like those of Fidel Castro in Cuba or the North Korean version of Gulag. The new Russia also reconsidered its traditional ties with radical "anti-imperialist" organizations worldwide. Moreover, the deep crisis of the Russian economy made it extremely difficult to support its former satellites and client movements.

Even deeper and more dramatic changes occurred within the former Russian "inner empire." By the end of 1991 Russia found itself without 14 former parts of the Soviet Union, with a territory reduced from 22.4 to 17 million square kilometers and a population of only 150 million, which was almost half of that of the USSR. Geopolitically it meant that Russia had lost a large part of the Baltic Sea area, Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, Transcaucasus, and Central Asia. From parts of its own country, those lands became for Russia sources of new challenges.

In sheer power terms Russia could no longer play the role the Soviet Union used to play on the world scene, although it inherited its position in the U.N. Security Council and the status of a nuclear power. The main difference was that Russia stopped to be a global power, although without fully admitting it. Since 1991 all Russia’s key interests have been concentrated in Eurasia. Unlike the Soviet Union, Russia could not play a significant role either in Central America or in Africa. Even such a long-time ally as Castro’s Cuba was sidelined in Russian foreign policy.

From a global Communist super power Russia turned into a Eurasian super power. It still has a unique potential for conflict and cooperation in this immense area—from Estonia to China and Japan— that can not be matched even by the United States. However, its present position and might is a far cry from that of the Soviet Union.

In Eurasia Russia had to reconsider former approaches and determine new interests and goals. The previously nonexistent "near abroad" (the former Soviet and now independent republics) was declared to be of highest priority. China turned from an ideological and political foe into an object of active attention and courting. North Korea was considered an expandable quantity and lost much of its importance. Japan has become a partner. Afghanistan turned from a top priority country into a distant perturbed land which would have been of no interest to Russia whatsoever if it were not for the Taliban offensive which could spread to Tajikistan and Central Asia.

In spite of all those changes, however, Russia remains a key international player. Eurasia, after all, is the continent where the most important and conflicting interests of the modern world have been played out. It is in Eurasia that almost all the most acute, modern crises are concentrated (Middle East, Iraq, Afghanistan, India-Pakistan, China-Taiwan, North and South Korea). It is also the area where the largest part of the world energy resources are concentrated.

By virtue of its geography, national interests and traditional presence, Russia is bound to play a significant role in six important regions of Eurasia: Europe, the Middle East (including Iraq and Iran), Transcaucasus, Central Asia, South Asia, and the Far East. It has and will have largely independent bilateral relations with such leading powers as China, India, and Iran. Its potential, both positive and negative, of influencing developments in all of these areas is second to only that of the United States. Therefore Eurasia is the area where Russia is in a position, if not to compete with the United States, then to assist or seriously complicate the achievement by the United States of its foreign policy and security goals.

All this puts into question the recent fashion to describe Russia as a mere "regional power," be it only for the reason that Eurasia is not just another region, but a combination of regions, critical to international peace, security, and well being.

Russia’s present approach to security and foreign policy issues was largely determined by the evolution of its relationship with the United States and Western allies in 1991-95. Initially, Moscow considered the relations with the United States in the political and security fields as its utmost priority, on which other elements of its foreign and security policy had to depend.

However, Moscow quickly learned that it would be not accepted as a full-fledged U.S. and Western ally, at least for a long time to come. The reason had much less to do with Russia’s non-Western geographical location (look at Japan or South Korea) than with the fact that neither Russia nor the West was in fact ready for such an alliance because of a set of reasons—political, psychological, historical and geopolitical—on both sides. Russia was not ready to integrate into the narrow circle of historically and culturally close Western nations. Nor could these nations accept a Russia that just emerged from its ignominious Communist identity as a reliable friend and ally.

The Western strategic answer to the Russian problem was twofold: to develop a special relationship with Moscow and simultaneously to expand NATO eastward. NATO enlargement has shown which nations the West was really ready to consider as its allies. Russia was definitely not among them, although it was admitted to the political part of the G-7 meetings and received a unique consultative status at NATO headquarters in Brussels, which recognized the fact that it remained a nuclear power and a country like no other from the point of view of its importance to Euro-American security. Yet, Moscow was left with little illusions about its possibilities to exercise a serious influence over strategic NATO decisions.

Thus, by the beginning of 1996 when Yevgeny Primakov replaced Andrei Kozyrev as Russia’s Foreign Minister, Russia found itself with no allies( with the exception of Armenia, Belarus and Tajikistan, which look more as client states). Its former Warsaw Pact allies reoriented themselves toward the West. The former Soviet republics started to show more independence vis-a-vis Moscow and looked to the west and south. By 1998 the Commonwealth of Independent States, created as a new community of post-Soviet republics, became largely irrelevant as a political organization.

Russia then faced a choice between accepting U.S. leadership without becoming part of the Western Alliance, or forging an international stand of its own, neither anti- nor pro-American, but based on the prevailing perception of its national interest. While Moscow engaged of the first course in 1992-1993, by the mid-1990s the second line started to prevail, as the "Alliance option" did not to work out. By that time it had become completely clear that Russia’s interests overlap only partly with those of the United States. In some areas those interests were not antagonistic but just different (for instance, toward China). In others they entered into direct or hidden conflict, be it over the policy toward the Bosnian Serbs, Iraq or Iran, or over access to the Caspian Sea oil resources.

Another reason for the evolution of Russian foreign and security policy into a "non-American direction" was that the former Soviet space has quickly turned into an area of competition for influence with the United States. This competition goes from Belarus to Turkmenistan. But nowhere is it seen with more clarity than in the Transcaucasus and Caspian Sea area, where large oil reserves have become the object of a 21st-century "Great Game."

The Clinton administration declared this area a strategic priority for the United States, drawing an angry reply from Boris Yeltsin at a Russian Security Council meeting in April 1997. A country with a 300-year-old historical presence in the Transcaucasus, Russia has good reasons to consider this area its own strategic priority. Whether it would become a perfect setting for a clash of strategic priorities or an area of cooperation, which was once suggested by Undersecretary of State Strobe Talbott, remains to be seen. Most probably, the relationship here will be largely competitive with some elements of cooperation between Moscow and Washington.

Moscow also came to the conclusion that traditional ties and contacts count a lot in world politics. It could not hope to start an extremely successful policy in areas where other powers exerted their influence, for instance, in former French Africa, in Latin America. The potential of relations with countries like South Korea or Israel was initially limited by their close ties with the United States. Moscow also found it extremely difficult to make a breakthrough in armaments markets, especially those controlled by the Americans and Europeans. Russia’s new presence on those markets was most unwelcome.

Thus, the new Russia had to find itself a new place in the world. Paradoxically, but predictably enough, it was squeezed out of those areas where it has already had an important presence and large political, business, and personal contacts—countries like India, Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Cyprus. Moscow found out that it could exercise influence and play a role (with some dividends for its international standing and economic interests) in the areas where the United States and its allies did not have comparable presence in the past, or where countries were looking for alternatives to American omnipotence.

Some of those countries are at odds with the United States, and others enjoy basically good relations (like India, at least before the recent nuclear tests) but tend to a non-U.S.-oriented foreign policy. As Russia’s possibilities are limited in other areas of the world, it is those countries that represent a natural field for Russian diplomacy that had been laboring those grounds for dozens of years.

It was therefore only natural that Moscow adopted a more benevolent approach to those long-term partners, even when they espoused risky policies coming at odds with Russia’s strategic interests. Ambassador Robert Oakley is right to point out in his paper that "Russia shares with the United States a strong aversion to India and Pakistan becoming nuclear powers" and acts correspondingly. The joint NATO-Russia declaration on this score, accepted in May 1998 in Luxemburg, that strongly condemned India and Pakistan nuclear tests and reflected that aversion. However, Moscow refrained from coming out too strongly against India, even in spite of U.S. pressures, and made it clear it would not support the U.S. policy of sanctions against New Delhi.

To sum it up: Russia could not be accepted into the Western Alliance, as it had no more leverage on Eastern Europe, and it could not quickly make up for its weakness in such areas as South East Asia, therefore it was logical that it went to those regions where it could play a role.

Security challenges for Russia should be divided into four categories. First, universally recognized threats and challenges that Russia shares with the United States and a dominant part of the international community. These are the proliferation of nuclear weaponry and other weapons of mass destruction, terrorism, narco-mafia, and ethnic and civil conflicts that affect international stability and security and are therefore an object of legitimate concern for Russia.

However, the perception of the danger of these conflicts for Russia’s interests is most intense when they happen close to Russian borders (like the conflicts in Tajikistan or Georgia) and tend to lose this intensity with distance. While the war in Bosnia or the Iraqi crisis attracted a lot of attention in Russia and prompted active diplomatic efforts on its part, the issue of Haiti or the bloody massacres in Ruanda did not attract serious attention.

This "Eurasianization" of the Russian mentality is a characteristic feature of the country’s post-Communist development. It constitutes an important difference between modern Russian and the Soviet Union, with its intense interest in a number of conflicts which were taking place far away from its borders—for reasons of rivalry with the United States and the West. However, this development did not prevent clashes between Russia and the United States over the areas Russia sees important for its long-term interests. Those interests tend to enter into contradiction with U.S. policies more often than they coincide with it.

There is also a great difference in the reading of major threats and challenges between Moscow and Washington. While the United States consider Iraq and Iran as a source of serious threats to its security and strategic interests, these two countries do not represent any visible threat for Russia or its interests. Moscow considers the U.S. alarm over Iraq and Iran’s military programs exaggerated, and actually more serving U.S. strategy in the Persian Gulf than reflecting the real state of affairs.

Russia does agree that all weapons of mass destruction Iraq might have should be destroyed, and that Baghdad should be deprived of the capacity to produce such weapons in the future. Russia’s voting in the United Nations confirms this stand. However, Moscow is against military strikes because it will fail to solve anything, while certainly delaying the day when the sanctions over Iraq are lifted and Baghdad starts to pay Russia back its $7 billion debt. Moscow is also interested to see Russian oil companies start operations in Iraq.

While one could object to the description of Russia’s position toward Iraq given by Kenneth Pollack (for instance, picturing Russia as "Saddam’s advocate" and apologist "in international forums"), he is certainly right in depicting U.S.-Russian differences over Iraq as "the most readily apparent and the least likely to be overcome in the near-term."

There is also a difference of perspectives. Stability in the Persian Gulf is not the highest priority of Russian diplomacy, be it only for geographical reasons. Unlike the United States, Russia is strategically absent from the Persian Gulf and does not have any troops on the ground there. In this context Russia tends to be more relaxed than the United States when it comes to the assessment of the danger Saddam Hussein represents for this region. As Mr. Pollack put it, "Moscow seems to have concluded either that Saddam could not pose a threat to the Persian Gulf or, that if he did, other forces would check him." What is more interesting in Mr. Pollack’s assessment is that he mentions that "Russian opposition on Iraq may be something of a quid pro quo for U.S. support of NATO expansion in the face of Russian objections." While Moscow’s stand on Iraq was not specifically designed to be an answer to NATO expansion, it is certainly true that a serious dissociation of U.S. and Russian security perceptions occurred when the U.S. administration decided to expand NATO in the face of Moscow’s adamant opposition. The feeling in Moscow is that if its political concerns have been baffled by the United States for the sake of their grand Euro-Atlantic strategy, why should Russia be much more forthcoming to U.S. exaggerated worries, especially when they clash with Russia’s own interests?

The second set of security challenges is, on the contrary, specifically "Russian" by character and, moreover, something Russia had never faced throughout its long history. These are threats to Russian territorial integrity from within, from separatists in Russia itself. The best known case is Chechnya. The secession of Chechnya from Russia has already partially happened, if not de jure, then at least de facto. Reflecting this paradox, one of Yeltsin’s advisors observed, "Chechnya is a part of the Russian Federation where Russian laws do not apply." However, Moscow does not recognize the self-proclaimed independence of Chechnya, nor will not do it in the foreseeable future, as such a precedent would constitute a capital threat to Russia’s territorial integrity.

Today the leaders of Chechnya are desperately seeking international recognition. According to their "foreign minister," Movlady Udugov, they have addressed 20 countries with suggestions to establish diplomatic relations. But even Moslem states sympathetic to the Chechen leaders and their attempts to turn Chechnya into an Islamic state are reluctant to go further than informal contacts out of fear of a direct split with Moscow. With the possibility of Chechnya’s international recognition still remote, the most immediate danger to Russia’s territorial integrity is Chechen expansion inside Russian borders. The Chechen secessionists are trying to broaden their political influence in the Northern Caucasus. Their first target is the autonomous republic of Dagestan inhabited by some 35 nationalities and known for the extremely low standard of living, even by Russian standards.

The export to Dagestan of Chechen secessionism and Islamism has been helped, as it is largely believed in Russia, by foreign centers of Islamic fundamentalism. This has already produced results. Out of a calm and provincial republic, Dagestan turned into a boiling pot of power struggle and terrorism in 1998. In July 1998 three villages inhabited by Wahabites (a radical version of Islam) declared their "independence." On August 20, the High Mufty of Dagestan critical to fundamentalists was blown into pieces as his car entered the central mosque of Dagestan. On September 4 a powerful explosion killed dozens of people in Makhachkala, the capital of the autonomy. Dagestan has entered into a phase of ethnic and religious unrest which may easily slip into some kind of open conflict.

While the present leadership of this republic is not tempted by prospects of independence from Russia, this situation may change, especially if secessionist trends are activated and supported from outside. If the phenomenon of Chechnya, which today remains in a state of "suspended secession," is repeated in other Caucasian republics, it would constitute a most serious blow to the Russian Federation. It may also provoke an upsurge of Islamic fundamentalism in such "dormant" semi-Islamic republics as Tatarstan, which is situated in the very center of European Russia.

These threats to Russian security are closely connected to the recent successes of the fundamentalist Taliban movement in Afghanistan. Most Russian and Central Asian officials and experts agree that the Taliban would not advance across the region’s international borders, but may well try to export their fundamentalist ideology. There are also fears that some field commanders might slip out of the control of the Taliban top brass and test their strength against the Tajik and Uzbek borders. On September 3, 1998 those fears were confirmed when a group of Taliban fighters broke the border with Tajikistan and exchanged fire with Russian border guards.

The Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Boris Pastukhov echoed those concerns, saying some Taliban officers have talked of plans "to seize the Uzbek cities of Samarkand and Bukhara." Pastukhov also stated that the Taliban’s rule would turn Afghanistan into "another hotbed of international terrorism." This suggestion was confirmed by the U.S. August 20 decision to deliver missile strikes against the supposed bases of terrorists situated on the territory of Afghanistan controlled by the Taliban.

While Russia does not have a common border with Afghanistan, there are strong reasons to believe that fundamentalist terrorism from Afghanistan would be directed not only against the United States, but also against Russia. The political climate between the Taliban and Moscow is far from friendly. The Taliban leaders accuse Russia of supporting anti-Taliban forces in Afghanistan. They also lay a claim for compensation by Russia for the losses during the 10-year Russian occupation of Afghanistan.

In this context some Taliban fighters, with or without backing from the Taliban chiefs, might be tempted to go to fight for the Islamic cause—and against Russia—into Chechnya or Daghestan. Reports that the Taliban are keen to establish ties with Chechnya only back those suspicions. The Chechens, on their side, have already declared that they intend to establish "diplomatic relations" with the Taliban. A Taliban-Chechen connection is therefore of a strong and immediate concern to Moscow.

Thus, it was not by chance that in April 1998 Uzbek President Karimov concluded an agreement with Boris Yeltsin to "fight militant fundamentalism." The Tajik President Emomali Rakhmonov also joined this agreement. Russian Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev and Rakhmonov called for a meeting of regional leaders and security officials to coordinate a response to the Taliban. Some military measures were taken to reinforce the border with Afghanistan in the framework of the tripartite collective security pact.

In view of this one could not agree more with Robert Oakley when he writes, "Taliban’s potential to inspire and perhaps assist Islamic opposition to the regimes of Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Kyrgystan is a justifiable fear and an added burden on Russian security forces which are primarily responsible for border protection." This point of view seems to be shared by a dominant part of the U.S. foreign policy establishment. Paradoxically enough, the Russian military presence in Central Asia, and especially in Tajikistan,, was tacitly accepted even by strong U.S. critics of so-called Russian "neo-imperialism."

For years China had been seen as the main pretender on Russian territories in the Far East. Since Moscow and Beijing signed a treaty on the demarcation of their common border, and since relations with China have become friendly and cooperative, this issue is seldom mentioned in political debates even by Russian nationalists. However, if Russia becomes even weaker, and China turns to a nationalist and expansionist foreign policy, the fear persists that it might be tempted to use Russia’s weakness in order to reconsider whatever agreement it has reached with Moscow.

Another danger is related to the decreasing population of the Russian Far East. Its inhabitants are tired of a rigorous climate and poor living conditions and tend to migrate to the European and southern parts of Russia. Thousands of Chinese illegally cross the border to establish themselves on the Russian lands. The Chinese government affirms it does not support this migration and suggests that Russian authorities send back all illegal Chinese immigrants. However, this situation points to the existence of steady Chinese demographic pressure on an area where Russians are becoming less and less numerous.

As for the claims of Japan to the Kuril Islands, they are considered much less a security issue than a political one. However, the whole problem has a security dimension that is taken into account in Moscow, especially in military circles.

The fourth type of security issues are military ethnic conflicts in neighboring states—Georgia, where since 1992 Abkhazia has been seeking independence, and Azerbaijan, where the Armenian-populated enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh declared its virtual independence from Baku. These conflicts in which Moscow has been mediating rather unsuccessfully for a number of years, and was even directly engaged through peace-keeping efforts, have become a constant headache for Russian diplomacy.

A closely connected issue is that of access to and transportation of the Caspian Sea oil. In a situation when such powers as the United States and Turkey are engaged in a steady effort to influence development in the Caspian energy area, Russia desperately looks for means and levers which would allow it to have an impact on developments in the area. Moscow is especially nervous about the prospects of the main pipelines going west and east, bypassing the Russian territory. The situation is compounded by the struggle around the fate of the Caspian Sea, in which Russia is opposed by Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan.

While ethnic conflicts in the vicinity of Russian borders do not represent an immediate threat to Russian security, they certainly are a source of trouble and worries for Moscow. The fact that those conflicts have not yet been solved, in spite of Russian political and diplomatic efforts, makes Moscow an object of constant criticism and attacks from Tbilisi and Baku. All of this seriously complicates Russia’s relations with Georgia and Azerbaijan. The Azeris accuse Moscow of taking the Armenian side in the conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh, the Georgians accuse Moscow of supporting the Abkhaz in their movement for independence. In fact, as strange as it may seem, Russia has never had a thought out and officially defined policy of helping the Abkhaz or the Armenians in those conflicts. Allegations that Moscow follows the "divide and rule" principle in the Transcaucasus presume a more rational and coherent policy than Russia really conducts in this area.

The conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh started in the times of the Soviet Union under Mikhail Gorbachev. The new Russia received it as the heritage of the USSR of the times of its decay, and never knew how exactly to deal with this issue. The only thing Moscow could think of, which is rather natural for a great power, was to use its role in the mediation of the crisis to assure Russian presence and influence in this strategically important area.

Russia did not help the Armenians to seize Nagorno-Karabakh and make it virtually independent from Baku. It was already in Armenian hands when Moscow started its diplomatic efforts around this issue. Moscow always recognized the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, and never supported the claims of Armenian radicals to this land. However, it is true that Moscow did not exercise a strong pressure on Yerevan in order to force it to abandon the support of the Karabakh rebels. First, because it would have been useless. When the former president of Armenia Levon Ter-Petrosyan agreed to the formula of reintegration of Nagorno-Karabakh into Azerbaijan suggested by the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE, now ONCE), he lost whatever popularity he had in Armenia and was quickly re-elected. Second, should Moscow have adopted such a course it would have spoiled its relations with Armenia which is considered in Moscow as Russia’s natural ally.

Other considerations played their role, too. While the mountainous Armenia—devoid of any important natural resources—has never been an object of attraction to the outside world, Azerbaijan, on the contrary, with its impressive oil reserves and access to the Caspian Sea, attracts foreign powers, especially the United States and Turkey. Unlike Armenian leaders which were rather responsive to Russian worries and interests in the area, Azeri President Geidar Aliev adopted a policy line which was met with a lot of skepticism in Moscow. It consists of a quiet opposition to the activities of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and of a slow detachment from Russia.

In those conditions Russia failed to see why it should jeopardize its ties with a country which values its relations with it for the sake of another country which distances itself from Russia more than often and shares very few of its approaches to regional issues.

The same largely applies to the conflict between Georgia and Abkhazia that started in July 1992 and cost more than 10,000 lives. It was not Russia that provoked that conflict. The conflict was a result of a civil war and a state of complete disarray which erupted in Georgia soon after it proclaimed

Taking into account the fiercely anti-Russian feelings displayed in Tbilisi, a part of Russian public opinion was sympathetic to the Abkhaz fight for independence. It is also true that the secessionists were helped at least in part by the Russian military, especially commanders of Russian troops stationed in Abkhazia itself. On their side Abkhaz leaders tend to stress their friendship with Moscow. There were even calls in Abkhazia to secede from Georgia and join the Russian Federation—something that provoked an enthusiastic, although mainly emotional, response in the State Duma and was never supported by the Kremlin.

While Russia’s mediating role in both conflicts gives it important levers of influence in the area, this role is much more of a problem than an asset for Russian foreign policy. Being a great power with important interests in the Transcaucasus, Moscow can not withdraw from a solution of those issues. But neither can it exercise a decisive influence on the conflicting sides. As a result Moscow had to accept some international mediation efforts. Hence the formation of the so-called Minsk group of the CSCE, which takes part in mediations over Nagorno-Karabakh.

Moscow’s incapacity to resolve the Abkhaz issue has led to a growing irritation in Georgia with Russia. In 1996 Schevardnadze chose to turn to the United States to solve this acute internal crisis. During a visit to Washington he expressed dissatisfaction with Russian peacekeepers in Abkazia and suggested to President Clinton to supplant them with those of the United Nations or the United States. Clinton reacted with understanding but carefully declined the offer.

Shevardnadze had no other option but to resume his talks with Moscow, and Russia responded by activating its efforts to find a compromise. The highest achievement of Russian diplomacy has been so far a personal meeting between Eduard Shevardnadze and the Abkhaz secessionist leader Vyacheslav Ardzinba. However, this meeting did not bring any practical results. By the end of summer 1998 violence was once again growing and prospects for peace were dim.

The developments both in Georgia and around Nagorno-Karabakh show that Moscow stands to lose more than gain out of these conflicts both politically and strategically. Russian interests would be better served if those conflicts were solved. However, their extremely complicated nature, as well as the fact that Russia lacks financial, economic, and political levers on the conflicting sides, prevents a reasonable outcome in both cases. Both of these conflicts are bound to be in the foreseeable future a constant feature of the security—or rather, insecurity—landscape close to Russian borders.

. The most important security challenge Russia has been traditionally facing in Asia is China. The unresolved dispute over the Soviet-Chinese border ignited mutual animosity for more than 30 years in the times of the Chinese-Soviet rift. At the end of the 1960s, when a significant border conflict on the Damansky Island in the river Ussuri exacerbated the tension between Moscow and Beijing, a war with China was feared by many Russians. The Chinese aggression against Vietnam in the 1970s was an additional source of high tension between the two countries.

However, since Chinese leaders adopted a more pragmatic foreign policy line and the Soviet Union engaged on the path of perestroika, relations became visibly better. The first step to their normalization was taken by Michael Gorbachev in 1989 when he visited Beijing on the eve of the bloody events in Tiananmen Square. And when Boris Yeltsin came to the Kremlin he strove to restore the strong Sin-Soviet friendship from the early 1950s. Although it never went that far, Yeltsin succeeded in removing the issues of discord between the two countries. Evidently, such rapprochement was also in the interests of Beijing. The turning point was Yeltsin’s visit in China in 1993. Since then relations between the two countries have shown steady progress. During Yeltsin’s visit to Beijing in April 1996, Russia and China reached a near-complete agreement on the demarcation of their 2,700-mile border—an issue that had prevented any rapprochement between them for decades.

Some military cooperation marked the new relationship. By the end of 1995 China reached a co-production deal with Moscow that allows it to manufacture the Russian Sukhoi-27 warplane. Moscow sold 26 of those planes to Beijing and an agreement was signed for 24 more. China is also buying Russian submarines, Il-28 bombers, and the S-300 anti-aircraft missile. During the 1996 summit in Beijing Yeltsin and Jian Zemin announced their intention to encourage expanded military cooperation.

Besides selling weapons to China, Moscow is careful not to leave any doubts in Beijing on where it stands on the Taiwan and Tibet issues. Taiwan is considered in Moscow as an undeniable part of China. Yeltsin resisted pressure from Russian business circles to establish virtual diplomatic relations with Taiwan by opening a visa section in the Taiwan trade and economic mission in Moscow. Numerous contacts with Taiwan by Russian representatives never acquire an official character. Russian support of Beijing during the March 1996 crisis in the straight of Taiwan was "highly appreciated" in the Chinese capital.

An important stepping stone of the new Russian-Chinese relationship was reached in 1996 when both sides, together with the leaders of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan, agreed on a set of confidence building measures to make military activities along their common borders more transparent.

The sales of Russian weapons to its former mortal enemy—and the future super power China aspires to become—are an object of some debates in the Russian mass media and professional circles. The biggest worry is that in the state of present disarray inside Russia those sales often go uncontrolled, and a number of related institutions and manufacturers seem to have their own "Chinese policy." However, in spite of warnings that Russia should be extremely cautious about helping its powerful neighbor to re-arm, this problem has not become a high profile issue in a cash starved Russia.

Russian policy toward China has a larger global dimension, too. Both sides have repeatedly denounced "hegemonism" and power politics, openly hinting at the United States. Both Moscow and Beijing support the concept of a multi-polar world that allows them to play a role in the solution of international issues rather than merely re-addressing it to the United States and their allies. As permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, Russia and China are interested in an active and effective United Nations.

While it would be an overstatement to talk of a full-scale coordination between Russia and China in foreign policy, they define their relations as a "strategic partnership" and often adopt joint stands on issues debated in the United Nations, as was the case during the Iraqi crisis. Thus, the new relationship with China is seen in Moscow not only as a guarantee of Russian security vis-a-vis the most powerful of its immediate neighbors, but also as a an important factor of Russia’s freedom to maneuver on the world scene, especially regarding the United States.

The military side of the Russian-Chinese rapprochement, as James J. Przystup points out, creates some important obstacles to a meaningful Russian-U.S. security cooperation in Asia. Russia’s strengthening of Chinese naval and air capabilities poses a number of potential strategic problems to the United States. However, the United States did not signal to Moscow that they were really interested in engaging in security cooperation with Russia in East Asia. On the contrary, Russia was almost ignored in the solution of the North Korean nuclear program crisis, and was seen as too weak to play a significant role for U.S. strategy in this area.

This explains why the concept of security cooperation between the two countries in Eastern Asia is extremely vague. In fact, until now it has been a meaningless diplomatic notion rather than a starting point for practical cooperation. Moscow fails to see any role for itself in the framework of such cooperation, besides in the role the United States is always keen to give Russia: to assist them in their foreign policy goals. The United States, which has its own set of strategic goals, fails to see why they should have Russia at their sides to reach those goals.

James Przystup is right to point out that "without a shared strategic vision for East Asia, security cooperation between Washington and Moscow in the region will be limited in scale and scope." In fact, it may even be nonexistent. The United States does not feel it needs Russia as a strategic partner in the area, and Russia does not see what it would gain out of merely following the U.S. lead. Unless China chooses a more expansionist and nationalist foreign policy that would bring Russia and the United States closer together, such a shared strategic vision is unlikely to appear. This means that security cooperation between Moscow and Washington in East Asia will remain for a long time a diplomatic "tournure" rather than a palpable reality.

Russian policy toward regional crisis in Eurasia—from the Middle East to the Korean peninsula—does not reflect its immediate security concerns. However, it pursues larger Russian strategic, political and economic interests on the world scene.

Russia is seriously alarmed by the growing trend by the United States to substitute unilateral action for joint resolutions on world crises. Russian opposition to an unlimited U.S. freedom of actions was manifest during the last crisis around the Iraqi military programs. Moscow agreed with Washington on the necessity to deprive Iraq of its weapons of mass destruction and capacities to produce them, but differed significantly on the means to achieve this aim. While the United States supported the military strike option, Moscow put stress on bilateral and multilateral diplomacy and U.N. negotiating efforts.

"I liked most of all how the two of us played off the Iraqi game," said a beaming Boris Yeltsin to Kofi Annan during his April 1998 trip to Moscow. There is no doubt Yeltsin understood well the role the U.S. military force and the threat of strikes played in making Saddam Hussein accept the proposals of the U.N. General Secretary. However, he was too keen to stress the achievements of Russian diplomacy to mention the U.S. role, at least before TV cameras.

This attitude reflects Moscow’s strong inclination to oppose a monopoly of a single power or group of powers of which Russia is not part of, on the settlement of international issues. This has partly to do with Russia’s remaining self-perception as a world power, and partly with the prevailing understanding of Russia’s national interests. Those interests are considered to be not necessarily contrary to those of the United States but rather lying in a different dimension.

This has become especially evident in the case of Iraq, and to an even greater extent, of Iran. While Iran is considered to be an enemy of the United States, Russia is threatened neither by Iran nor by the terrorist groups it reportedly supports. For Moscow, the danger of radical Islam is associated not with Iran, but with the Chechens or the Taliban fundamentalists. Tehran is important to Russia because they share approaches to the Caspian Sea oil resources and Iran plays a significant role in the Transcaucasus and Central Asian areas. For Russia, Iran remains a traditional trade and economic partner, and a potential sources of lucrative deals in the oil and gas transportation field. While the United States is seen in Moscow as striving to bypass Russia as the Caspian oil is brought westward, Iran shares Moscow’s approaches to the pipeline routes from the Caspian area.

The tension over Iran remains, according to leading U.S. officials, a huge issue between Moscow and Washington. The U.S. views Russia, as Mr. Pollack puts it, as "among the worst offenders in transferring WMD technology to Iran." The Russian government vehemently rejects this accusation. Moscow fails to understand why it should not sell Iran nuclear reactors of the same type the United States agreed to give to North Korea (which can not be used for making weapons plutonium) and why it should abandon an $800 million contract for construction of a nuclear plant in Iran. Moscow insists that its cooperation with Iran is limited to civilian nuclear power and complies with the restrictions of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

As for the accusations that Russia sells Iran missile technologies, Moscow points out that no official institution has been involved in such deals. It also promised to Washington better monitor such matters. There are, of course, always possibilities for of Russian individuals—specialists in missile technologies—to sign contracts with Iran and work on its military programs. This cannot be fully prevented by the Russian government.

Both the Iran and the Iraqi cases show that Russia and the United States follow largely diverging agendas on those two countries. While some of their interests do coincide, others do not. For the time being, disaccord would probably prevail over mutual approaches. This is compounded by a large disparity of views, especially over Iran’s potential danger, which leads to a standing collision between Moscow and Washington. Therefore one could agree with Mr. Pollack’s assessment: until Saddam Hussein remains the master of Iraq and the Iranian regime does not melt, serious disagreements between Russia and the United States are bound to stay.

The residual complex of Russia’s former super power rivalry with the United States (which is similarly felt in U.S. foreign policy) also plays a role here. All of these factors define the deeply rooted psychological opposition in Russia to a "uni-polar world" headed by the United States.

In his May 12, 1998, address to the Russian Foreign Ministry Boris Yeltsin went as far as to present the establishment of a uni-polar world as the main threat to international security. Hinting at the United States and NATO, he fiercely denounced "attempts to impose on the world the interests of one state or group of states." He also stressed that, in the contemporary world, "There is no place for a dictate of one even most powerful state."

Russia felt sidelined when the United States virtually excluded Moscow from the solution of the conflict over North Korean nuclear programs in 1994 and when Washington displayed its irritation at Primakov’s attempts to restore Russia’s negotiating role in the Middle East process in 1996. Therefore, Moscow took special pride in the role it played in resolving, however imperfectly, the crisis over Iraq in November 1997-March 1998 and in opposing the U.S.-backed military option. Since 1995 Russia has also been insisting on its policy of cooperation with Iran in spite of harsh American protests. Finally, in spring 1998 Russian diplomacy opposed a possible NATO intervention in Kosovo.

While Yevgeny Primakov, for understandable reasons, preferred not to recognize this new reality, there are signs that the Russian executive is well aware of the change in the situation. When the United States delivered missile strikes against supposed bases of terrorists in Sudan and Afghanistan in August 1998, Boris Yeltsin showed his "indignation" and said he "condemned" American strikes.

Although commentators stressed that Yeltsin’s indignation had rather to do with the fact that he was not notified about the strikes by his "friend Bill" beforehand, there was no doubt that the Russian president, and the majority of Russia’s politicians, strongly disliked this additional manifestation of U.S. omnipotence. However, the Kremlin was careful to correct the negative impact Yeltsin’s public declarations could have had on Russian-U.S. relations on the eve of the Clinton visit to Russia (September 1-3, 1998). The next day, Yeltsin’s spokesman stated that Russia and the United States were in the same boat in the struggle against international terrorism. Thus, condemnation turned into support, at least partially. Moscow chose not to capitalize in the Arab world on the negative feelings U.S. strikes provoked there by closing its eyes on this evident and alarming display of American might.

The main questions Russia faces today in the field of security are interrelated. Will it be strong enough to overcome secessionist trends inside its own territory? Will it be capable of helping its allies in Central Asia to withstand the pressure of Islamic fundamentalism? And will it be in a position to be assertive enough to insist on an independent role in the solution of international crises? It is on this that depends the future status of Russia as a great power and its Eurasian security role. Should Russia give a negative answer to those questions, it will slowly degenerate into a decaying regional power, incapable of securing its interests outside its borders and doomed to a slow disintegration, like a dying Leviathan.

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