Relations Between the United States and the Newly-Independent Russian Federation

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There was also the question of economic reform, and there, I think, we can only be self-critical; that is, those of us in the Clinton administration looking back to some extent because the fact of the matter is that economic reform could have used a lot more major up-front support from the outside world. We and other Russian reformers should have paid a lot more attention to the kind of structural side of what was necessary in economic reform and ensuring that there would be real rule of law.

First of all, I think it ought to be self-evident, but I feel I have to say it - Russia needs to figure very near the top in the strategic concerns of the United States. It's too big a country to fall off the radar screen. It's still massively armed with nuclear weapons. It borders more states than any other country on the planet. It has vast natural reserves. It's got huge capacity for both good and ill. And it's got to be consistently a major focus of American attention. The second point is Russia is not going to go away. And it's ridiculous to talk about Russia as though it's something to be won or lost by the west. It's going to find its own path, and the challenge for American policy is to help provide guideposts for what a path is that will both serve Russia's interests and also those of the world.

There needs to be a lot more candid interchange, I think, between the private sectors, between the NGO world, the think-tank world, the university world. Across the board there needs to be more engagement. Our Congress hasn't been sending anywhere near as many Congressional delegations. It used to kind of drive our Ambassadors and Embassy staffs politely and quietly nuts when they were always pouring into Moscow. But it was very important to thinking. The Russian language isn't being taught in American schools anywhere near as much as it was when I was a teenager, on the principle, "Know thy enemy." Well, Russia's not our enemy anymore, but it's still one very important country and we have to know it, we have to understand it, and we have to be able to talk to them - both literally and figuratively - in their own language.

The general point I would make is how important it is for anybody who takes a proper interest in Russia to get out of Moscow itself. And St. Petersburg is always an important place to visit for all kinds of reasons, but get out of St. Petersburg, too, and get out into that great big vast country. And that means getting on trains and airplanes - and not always in the most comfortable conditions - and moving around the country just so you get a sense of what it is that makes those different parts of the country so different from each other.