There are several big issues that are circling the Russian news agencies: One is Russia joining NATO and the next is that the US and Russia are currently negotiating a successor to the START nuclear disarmament treaty.
Lavrov the Russian Foreign Minister has always made it clear that NATO is the “hind end of a donkey” and he was given normative support for this thinking recently:
Madeleine Albright, secretary of state under former President Bill Clinton and currently involved in the development of a new NATO strategic concept, has only nurtured Lavrov’s skepticism. Washington, she says, will never allow Russia to influence NATO strategy: “We will not allow the tail to wag the dog.” (Link)
That is where the truth lies and to think different would be a total lack of empiricism…
As far as the successor to the START treaty: America has created a quandary for itself! Russia who has stayed firm on her commitments, thoughts and factors. Is seeing an America that talks out of two mouths. One of the most important factors to Russia is American missile defense in countries around Russian borders.
As Prime Minister Putin has eloquently stated in a recent speech in the Pacific coastal city of Vladivostok.
If Russia did nothing to oppose the missile defense system, he added, the other side would “feel completely safe under its missile shield, and it would do as it pleased. The balance would be gone, and aggression in politics and business would grow abruptly.” Putin’s conclusion is that “Russia needs new offensive systems.”
So as America plays games of decisive destruction of confirmatory relations with major world powers such as China and Russia – America keeps wondering why no-one wants to trust her…