But the year 2012 (after Russian parliamentary and presidential elections) became a stumbling block. We sensed a very strong, negative impulse from the Obama administration. It started to make very strong comments about the elections and criticize the Russian authorities for a number of things that were happening in Russia. So the reset worked for the first three years of the first Obama term, but in 2012 it stopped working.

During 2012, especially with Hillary Clinton in the State Department, we had the feeling that the worst years of the Bush administration were back. Hillary Clinton went as far as to say that the United States would fight with all its might against the Customs Union [of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia] and attempts to create the Eurasian Union on the territory of the former Soviet Union—even though it is well known that the Customs Union and the Eurasian Union have no political or military dimension.

There were a number of statements from Russia criticizing American policy in this really critical year. The discord over the ABM issue and of course the Syrian crisis brought the reset policy to its end. The Libyan war also contributed to the impression that Obama was not so different from Bush. As a result, in 2012 the initially positive image of the Obama administration started to deteriorate in Russia, and is still deteriorating.

The appointments of the new secretaries of state and defense were taken rather positively in Moscow. But despite this, on the practical side of the story, we don’t see many breakthroughs. The relationship between Washington and Moscow is still spoiled by the negative legacy of 2012: the year started with accusations of the Russian authorities rigging the elections, and it ended with the Magnitsky Law. In Moscow the law was seen as an unprovoked attack: Russia did not adopt an anti-American law; it is the U.S Congress that has adopted an anti-Russian law signed by President Obama. In April the so-called “blacklist” was created on the American side, and Russia responded with its own blacklist. This is the new negative agenda that unfortunately has appeared in bilateral Russian-American relations.

In Russia this administration will also be judged by its policies in Syria. There is already a feeling that we see a replay of Iraq as in 2003, with accusations against the Syrian government that are not based on incontrovertible evidence, but are just statements based on some controversial intelligence. There is a strong impression in Moscow that these accusations are just used as a pretext to engage in war. If there is an escalation, if nothing comes of Geneva II, and if after this U.S. decision the rebels start a new military campaign—and the whole diplomatic effort is devastated by this military campaign—then it can be expected that Russian public opinion of the Obama administration will not differ much from its opinion of the Bush administration.

Paul Saunders: Thank you very much.

Alexey K. Pushkov is chair of the Russian State Duma’s international affairs committee. He is a member of The National Interest's advisory council.

Paul J. Saunders is executive director of The Center for the National Interest and associate publisher of The National Interest. He served in the State Department from 2003 to 2005.

Image: Wikimedia Commons/Richter Frank-Jurgen. CC BY-SA 2.0.