This is a legacy website featuring a collection of work by the Carnegie Endowment’s global network of scholars on topics including Russia, Ukraine, Eurasia, and the post-Soviet states. This site is a product of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace based in Washington, D.C. For more recent work by Carnegie scholars in this field, please visit Carnegie Politika.
The first three months of U.S.-led sanctions did not cause yet deep-seated problems for Russian economy. Regardless, the stakes for Russia are very high. Like the proverbial ancient warrior, it is standing at a crossroads now.
The Ukraine crisis has opened up a period of intense geopolitical competition, rivalry, and even confrontation between Russia and the West. The area of competition is again Eastern Europe; only this time, further to the east of its Cold War namesake.
The May 25 presidential vote has marked the end of the first phase of the Ukraine crisis, which will continue to reshape the global strategic landscape. For Russia important result of the crisis is pivot to Asia.
The Sino-Russian gas deal emphasizes and accelerates the fading of Russia’s until-now special relationship with the EU. The partnership between Russia and China is acquiring truly strategic depth.
Russia should not treat the post-2014 situation in Afghanistan as a potential disaster for its security in the south. Nevertheless, the coalition withdrawal from Afghanistan will force Russia to take more responsibility for regional security.
Today, the Russia-U.S. security relationship has both areas which will not likely see advances and opportunities for progress.
Vladimir Putin’s first visit outside the former Soviet Union since the beginning of the Ukraine crisis is to China. The vector of Russian foreign policy has changed dramatically, and Russia has been seeking ways to strengthen ties with leading non-Western powers.
Germany is Europe’s sole emerging power, and potentially a power in Eurasia, and Ukraine is a good place to start working toward its new role. For starters, Germany needs to stop thinking of Ukraine as a U.S.-Russian issue, and assume responsibility there on behalf of the EU as a whole.
Since the 1990s, warnings from Russian liberals that Western pressure would push Russia toward China have failed to materialize. Now, however, faced with U.S.-led geopolitical pressure in Eastern Europe and East Asia, Russia and China are likely to cooperate more closely.
The quarterly journal Pro et Contra, published by the Carnegie Moscow Center, is being retooled as a web-based online publication, which the Center plans to roll out later in 2014.