Stephen Cohen on Kremlin-Run TV Lambasting U.S.

Russia expert Stephen Cohen recently appeared on Russia Today, a Kremlin-run television station based in Moscow, to criticize the “asymmetry” of U.S.-Russia relations. The problem, as Cohen sees it, is that ever since the 1991 Soviet collapse, U.S. leaders have insisted on viewing the United States as the winner of the cold war and Russia as the loser. (So have a lot of other people, including many Russians, but that’s beside the point.) Cohen counters that the cold war ended before the Soviet Union did and that America’s insistence that it prevailed in the tug-of-war between democracy and tyranny has fueled Washington’s one-sided policy vis-a-vis Moscow, whereby Washington takes but refuses to give. Failure to chart a truly post-cold war course will lead to a new cold war, Cohen says, echoing Russian President Dmitry Medvedev. True, there has been plenty of American ham-handedness when it comes to Russia. But to suggest that American triumphalism is responsible for a worsening of U.S.-Russian relations is a reach: Russia is and has always been run by a criminal syndicate — tsarist, Soviet or post-Soviet — and until Russia transcends its criminality, until it “grows up” and embraces the rule of law, there will be no long-term cooperation between the two powers. There may be moments when our interests coincide, but these will only be moments.

The link to Cohen’s appearance:
http://www.thenation.com/video/161169/reset-us-russia-relations-lacks-substance