The year 2021, which goes down in history, was the second in a row that passed under the COVID-19 pandemic sign with all that it implies. And still, international life continued unabated, despite the coronavirus. The Russian-American relations have become the primary focus of the world community's attention.
This year, Joe Biden administration's approach towards Russia seems to have been finalized. Against all the odds and campaign statements by the current American President himself, a tough course towards Moscow has not been unequivocally adopted. Rather, the White House chose the tactics of deals – deals Donald Trump was suspected of carrying out at some point.
Many I's were dotted at the Geneva meeting between Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin in June. Before it was held, both Moscow and Washington warned against inflated expectations from the talks, all the more so no official documents were planned to be signed. And yet the main thing was done: the leaders outlined rules for the game to be guided by in the future.
The Villa La Grange conversation lasted four and a half hours and was followed by two separate press conferences. That's where the term "red lines" appeared in the American press. In Geneva, Biden drew them for Putin – at least, judging by what was the media got to know. The American President said the United States should have guarantees against cyber attacks. He even gave Putin a list of critical sectors that should not be attacked by hackers, who, as Washington assured, are bound tightly with the Russian special services.
The United States has also shown interest in negotiating strategic stability, actually nuclear arms control. Biden said Russia needed to maintain neutrality in the US-China confrontation and not be particularly zealous in putting pressure on Ukraine. At the same time Russian concerns about NATO expansion eastwards were ignored.
The visible and perhaps the most striking result of the meeting between the two politicians was the return of the two countries' ambassadors, who were previously recalled for consultations, to their places of work in Moscow and Washington. This, however, entailed no final normalization of embassy activities.
In December, the second big conversation between the two leaders took place amid NATO's stepped-up activity at the Russian borders. Their video conference talks lasted two hours. Putin informed Biden, who expressed concern over the situation in Ukraine, about Kiev's failure to comply with the Minsk Agreements and the sabotage by the Ukrainian authorities of early agreements to resolve the Donbass situation. The Russian leader noted it was NATO that made dangerous attempts to develop Ukrainian territory and built up military potential next to the Russian borders. Putin also stressed that his troops are stationed in the territory of Russia, without threatening anyone. He called preparations for invading Ukraine someone's make-believe.
Conspicuous is the fact that the December meeting of the two presidents was marked by the Russian leader's drawing "red lines" this time. Putin announced the need to enter into a legally binding treaty that would guarantee NATO's non-expansion to the East. Considering the talks' outcome, Russia prepared and handed over to the American side drafts of two documents on security guarantees across the entire European continent and declared readiness to immediately begin relevant negotiations. Those may begin as early as January 2022, while the documents are sometimes called the "Putin doctrine" in the media.
"There are some signals that the partners are ready to work on this. But there is also a danger that they will attempt to stall, dumping our proposals into a swamp," Putin noted to this effect.
In turn, as Assistant to the Russian President Yuri Ushakov said, it will take many months or even years to resolve problems accumulated in Russian-US relations. "It’s still early to review the results, a lot of time is needed for this because so many problems accumulated that it will take more than a month to resolve them and even maybe more than one year. We’ll see," he told reporters after the December 7 talks between Presidents Putin and Biden.
The near future will apparently witness further diplomatic contacts between Russia and the United States under the sign of discussing the "Putin doctrine". And future meetings of the two leaders will probably depend on the results of these negotiations. Putin and Biden might meet next year. At least, the US leader expressed hope they'd get a chance to communicate in person. The Kremlin is still cautious, with no specific dates for the meeting determined so far, but the Russian leader is already known to have a number of foreign trips planned for 2022. In particular, Putin is eager to attend the opening ceremony of the Beijing Winter Olympics in February next year, and meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Moreover, people's attention is arrested by the leaders of Russia and the United States over the two countries' presidential elections scheduled for 2024 in either case. Commenting upon Joe Biden's words about his intention to run for the second term, Putin said he was absolutely right to announce this. The only thing is that 79-year-old Biden should be healthy enough for this. And Putin himself does not speak about whether he wants run for presidency again or not. According to the recent amendments to the Russian Constitution, he has an opportunity to be re-elected. However, he says no decisions have been made about this, and pursuing this subject destabilizes the situation.
Regardless of what skeptics say, there has been some progress in the US-Russian bilateral dialogue over the past year, despite Washington's aggressive rhetoric. At least at the highest level. It would be nice to believe that this will eventually yield an accommodation between Moscow and Washington to meet the interests of both the two nations and residents of other countries.
