A non -sided summit

Explaining the decision to cancel the bilateral meeting of the presidents of Obama and Putin in St. Petersburg, the press secretary of the White House Jay Carney cited a number of reasons. "Having carefully studied this issue, we came to the conclusion that recently, on the agenda of the bilateral American-Russian dialogue, there has not been reached quite a progress for a meeting at the highest level," Karney said. In particular, he indicated a lack of progress in areas such as missile defense, international security issues, bilateral commercial and trade relations and human rights.

Moreover, Karni added, when making a decision, the provision of temporary asylum Russia was also the former employee of the American intelligence agencies Edward Snowden, who in the United States wants to be involved in court for disclosing secret information. An influential resort-republican John McCain from Arizona called the provision of asylum Snowden slap to all Americans, and his colleague from South Carolina Lindsay Graham even offered to boycott the Olympic Games in Sochi. All this, as well as the Russian law on orphans in the United States, the pursuit of the LBG-community in Russia and the position occupied by Russia on Syrian and Iranian problems, forced many in the United States to conclude that relations between the two countries have been at the lowest mark since the Cold War. The former assistant to the State Secretary and the US Ambassador to Ukraine, an employee of the Bruckingza Institute, Stephen Feifer , does not agree with this statement.

- I believe that such statements are absolutely erroneous. Let's look at how things were five years ago, after the Russian-Georgian conflict. Then there was almost no cooperation between Moscow and Washington. The contract of the START-1 expired in December 2009. There was no cooperation on Afghanistan, there were serious disagreements in the approaches to the countries of the post -Soviet space. There was an armed confrontation between Russia and Georgia, and in Washington, there were people who proposed to striking from air on objects in South Ossetia, which would lead to the death of Russian troops. Today nothing of the kind is observed. Yes, indeed, our relations with Russia are now going through difficult times, but, it seems to me, they must also be considered in the context of those areas in which cooperation continues.

Stephen Feifer is agreed by the specialist in international relations from the University of Georgetown Angela Stent :

- Our relations with Russia were worse than now, in 1999, at the end of the presidential term, Bill Clinton, when the conflict in Kosovo was in full swing. I do not know what will happen if we hit Syria, but today relations with Russia are better than in 2008 during the Russian-Georgian War. Over the past twenty years, that is, since the collapse of the Soviet Union, in our relations with Russia there has been a certain cyclicity: in both first presidential terms, Bill Clinton and George Bush relations with Russia have been good and they were characterized by great hopes. By the end of the second period in the White House, both presidents were disappointed.

In the case of President Obama, this disappointment occurred a little earlier.

According to Angela Stent, the difficulties for Barack Obama are related to the fact that when he became president, he relied on relations with Dmitry Medvedev. “Now,” she says, “in the Kremlin, Vladimir Putin is again in the Kremlin, and since he returned there, relations between our countries have become complicated. Now they have made a round down.”

According to Angela Stent, providing Edward Snowden asylum in Russia was a catalyst for the abolition of the meeting, but still not the main reason:

- Even before Mr. Snowden landed in Sheremetyevo, in Washington they felt that the Russian side itself did not know what she wanted from the meeting of the presidents, and it was advisable to hold such meetings only if they could bring tangible results. Well, then Snowden flew to Moscow, and the conversation went about him in stretched colors.

Stephen Feifer also believes that the problems in relations with Russia began long before the epic with Snowden and that they are primarily associated with the return to the Kremlin of Vladimir Putin and that the Russian leader decided to make anti -Americanism part of his domestic policy:

-Somewhere since the end of 2011, we began to feel that the Kremlin encourages anti-Americanism and uses it for its own purposes. To exhibit the United States as a potential enemy has become for Putin a way to enlist the support of the so -called conservative Russian citizens. The Kremlin, apparently, realized that the middle class of Moscow and St. Petersburg for Putin was lost. So he is looking for support among those who like anti -Americanism.

But this kind of policy, the former American diplomat notes, could not but do without consequences. The tone of the American-Russian dialogue began to change gradually, since in Washington they believe that Putin made too high rates on an anti-American map, and this is irritated here.