Visepresident Biden har gjort det igjen. Etter å ha motsagt Obama om bl.a. Israels rett til å angripe Iran og effekten av den økonomiske hjelpepakken, har han gitt et intervju i Moskva, der han påpeker Russlands indre svakhet og tror dette vil gjøre landet mer medgjørlig overfor vesten. Vi sakser fra Wall Street Journal:
Vice President Joe Biden said in an interview that Russia’s economy is «withering,» and suggested the trend will force the country to make accommodations to the West on a wide range of national-security issues, including loosening its grip on former Soviet republics and shrinking its vast nuclear arsenal. Mr. Biden said he believes Russia’s economic problems are part of a series of developments that have contributed to a significant rethinking by Moscow of its international self-interest. The geographical proximity of the emerging nuclear programs in Iran and North Korea is also likely to make Russia more cooperative with the U.S. in blocking their growth, he said.
But in the interview, at the end of a four-day trip to Ukraine and Georgia, Mr. Biden said domestic troubles are the most important factor driving Russia’s new global outlook. «I think we vastly underestimate the hand that we hold,» he said.
«Russia has to make some very difficult, calculated decisions,» Mr. Biden said. «They have a shrinking population base, they have a withering economy, they have a banking sector and structure that is not likely to be able to withstand the next 15 years, they’re in a situation where the world is changing before them and they’re clinging to something in the past that is not sustainable.»
…
He said Russian leaders are gradually beginning to grasp their diminished global role, but that the U.S. should be cautious not to overplay its advantage.
«It won’t work if we go in and say: ‘Hey, you need us, man; belly up to the bar and pay your dues,’ » he said. «It is never smart to embarrass an individual or a country when they’re dealing with significant loss of face.
En kan undres hvordan en slik karakteristikk av hårsåre Russland, paret med blottstilling av vestlig taktikk (forutsatt at dette faktisk er rådende amerikansk tenkning) rimer med Obamas løfte om å «hit the reset-button» i forholdet. Er dette ment som en «skjult» advarsel til Russland, formulert av en visepresident som etterhvert er beryktet for sin evne til å tråkke i salaten og derfor gir Obama en mulighet til utad å benekte at dette er USAs syn? Eller har Biden (igjen) tråkket i salaten – og i så fall på hvilken måte? Formulerer han virkelig en alternativ politikk med sine mange merkelige utspill, eller avslører han simpelthen administrasjonen egentlige syn på ting, slik noen kommentatorer har hevdet? Eller er utspillet ment for amerikansk innenrikspolitikk, for å avdempe kritikken mot Obama som for «soft» på utenrikspolitikk?
Ifølge Washington Post er reaksjonene sterke i russisk presse og fra russiske myndigheter:
Biden’s comments appeared to catch the Kremlin by surprise, coming less than three weeks after President Barack Obama said on a visit to Moscow that the U.S. wants to see a «strong, peaceful and prosperous Russia.»
«It raises the question: Who is shaping U.S. foreign policy? The president or members of his team, even the most respected ones?» said Kremlin foreign policy adviser Sergei Prikhodko….
… Most Russian newspapers put Biden’s interview on their front pages Monday, with headlines casting doubt on Washington’s commitment to forge a more constructive relationship with Moscow.
«Joe Biden unexpectedly returned to the rhetoric of the previous Bush administration,» the newspaper Kommersant wrote.
Moskovsky Komsomolets said Biden, with his «boorish openness,» showed what the Obama administration really thinks about Russia. «We should respond to the Yankees in the same way,» the newspaper wrote. «Any other language, unfortunately or fortunately, they do not understand.»
Noen er imidlertid inne på samme problemstillinger som undertegnede:
Some newspapers and commentators noted that Russians say the same things about themselves. The question, they said, was why Biden made the comments so quickly after this month’s summit by Obama and President Dmitry Medvedev, and after Biden’s own trip last week to Ukraine and Georgia, former Soviet republics whose growing ties to the West are deeply resented in Moscow.
Sergei Rogov, director of the government-funded USA and Canada Institute, was quoted in Kommersant as saying the interview was aimed in part at addressing criticism in the U.S. that the Obama administration was too soft on Russia.
Some commentators said it was wrong to see Biden as diverging from the policy set by Obama, as suggested by Prikhodko.
Biden was most likely expressing Washington’s «Plan B,» said Vladimir Milov, a former deputy energy minister who now heads his own think tank. If the Kremlin proves unwilling to compromise, the United States was likely to reduce relations to a minimum and push Moscow to the periphery of world politics, Milov wrote in the online Gazeta.ru.