Adjunct professor at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations, member of the Working Group on the Future of U.S.-Russia Relations.
The putative adoption of the Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act, the trials of Russian citizens in U.S. courts, as well as the two countries' perspectives on the conflict in and around Syria have continued to be controversial for Russia-U.S. relations. And yet neither of these problems appears strategic or intractable.
Russia and the United States have failed in the efforts at bilateral energy cooperation. According to Mikhail Troitskiy, Adjunct professor at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations, member of the Working Group of U.S.–Russia Relations, due to the lack of trust between Russian and the U.S. politicians and the lack of standing issues that haven’t been resolved, both countries are not enthusiastic about pushing their companies towards cooperation.
The U.S.-Russia “reset” has become an acknowledged foreign policy triumph for the incumbent administrations in Washington and Moscow. However, amid the difficulties with negotiating further arms control agreements, politicians and pundits on both sides are tempted to conclude that the reset has largely run its course. Such talk is premature at best and harmful to U.S.-Russia relations at worst.
Among emerging challenges to international security, the threats posed by potential proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and missile technologies would seem to be one that would unite the United States, its NATO allies, and Russia.