Gordon M. Hahn — REPORT: Towards a Realist American Russia Policy (Revised Final Edition, Parts 1 and 2)

American foreign policy, especially its Russia policy, is a runaway train without rails, driven by a troubling confluence of hubristic ideological influences and bureaucratized sectoral interests networked through Washington. These two kinds of influence too often are neither disinterested, nor in the American interest, and deprive U.S. foreign policy of a strategic imperative. The former influence consists of American democratic messianism and revolutionism that push for regime change on a far too broad basis, weakening our foreign policy’s realist component while simultaneously discrediting its idealist component. Bureaucractic influences is made up of out-of-control bureaucratic, military, military-industrial, think tank, and ideological interests that manipulate or sincerely foster American messianism and revolutionism. The combination of uncontrolled messianism and sectoral interests and imperatives have resulted in an ‘imperial overstretch’ that far outstrips America’s declining capacity and power in the world. This growing gap between American ambitions and capacity is compounded by China’s rise, Russia’s resurgence, and the Sino-Russian strategic partnership. This paper focuses on problems in U.S.-Russian relations and their possible solutions....

Russian and Eurasian Politics
REPORT: Towards a Realist American Russia Policy (Revised Final Edition, Parts 1 and 2)
Gordon M. Hahn, analyst and Advisory Board member at Geostrategic Forecasting Corporation, member of the Executive Advisory Board at the American Institute of Geostrategy, a contributing expert for Russia Direct, a senior researcher at the Center for Terrorism and Intelligence Studies, Akribis Group, and; and an analyst and consultant for Russia – Other Points of View