Putin – Obama: Sparring Match or Secret Alliance?

Global politics are just like Gogol’s description of Nevsky Prospect: “Everything is a lie, everything is a dream; nothing is at it seems.” Two heads of state can swear eternal friendship on camera and give assurances of their mutual interests while their countries remain irreconcilable rivals. The opposite is also true: Two heads of state can trade barbs in public while laying the groundwork for real rapprochement backstage.

History gives a number of examples. Take the U.S. and Great Britain during World War II. Were they friends or enemies? At first glance, the answer seems obvious. Washington and London joined forces to fight Hitler. Roosevelt and Churchill met dozens of times, and their “Atlantic Charter” became the basis for the United Nations. However, let’s remember that the primary outcome of World War II, other than the Soviet Union defeating Hitler’s Germany, was America’s emergence as the number one world power while the sun set on the British Empire. It’s no coincidence that some historians consider the contrast between America and Britain to be the biggest sore spot of the war.

One could view the current relationship between Putin’s Russia and Obama’s America as an example of the reverse. There are numerous indications that this relationship is beginning to look more and more like an alliance. At first glance, that statement appears to be an unrealistic fantasy. After all, the global media covered Vladimir Putin and Barack Obama verbally sparring at the U.N.’s anniversary session of the General Assembly. Commentators meticulously recorded the argument. Russia’s leader called Assad’s Syria the main “dam” to hold back “the Islamist flood.” His American colleague constantly repeated the slogan: “Assad must go.” Top pundits even gave a detailed account of how at the U.N. banquet, Obama’s body language toward Putin seemed to say: “We have to clink glasses as part of our work, but I’d never see you again if I had the choice.”

But now, let’s turn off the TV and try to evaluate the real outcome of the most important meeting in the halls of the General Assembly. The mere fact that Putin and Obama talked for as long as they did shows that they had a lot to talk about. That itself inspires optimism. After all, this isn’t the first time a face-to-face meeting between these countries’ leaders has helped Russia and America avoid falling into a dangerous, even fatal, trap. For example, take George W. Bush’s meeting with Putin in Bratislava in 2001, when the U.S. president “looked into Vladimir’s eyes and saw his soul.” This meeting allowed Moscow and Washington to overcome an extremely dangerous crisis left over from the Clinton era caused by NATO bombardments in Yugoslavia and the events surrounding the Russian submarine Kursk. True, Russo-American relations have navigated dangerous waters since then, but in the 2000s, the U.S. was busy with Afghanistan and Iraq and barely touched Russia.

Then again, meetings between presidents aren’t the only thing that matter for relations between Moscow and Washington. There is also a group of American elites behind the wheel of U.S. foreign policy. After all, America isn’t some monolith ruled by a single caste. It’s more like a battlefield between different clans, each of which has its own global ambitions and views on America’s place in the world.

Which groups have joined battle in the fight to determine what the post-crisis world will look like as the dollar’s supremacy passes from the scene?

First, there are the so-called “hawks.” These individuals want to save Washington’s hegemony at all costs, as well as preserve the economic system based on the dollar’s monopoly as a global reserve currency. They are prepared to incite large-scale military conflicts around the world in order to achieve their “American dream.” Then they can write off debt, plunge their opponents into chaos, and preserve America’s status as a shining “city on a hill.” Both Republicans (historian and commentator Robert Kagan, Sen. John McCain) and Democrats (Hillary Clinton) uphold this view.

However, members of the other branch of America’s elite, the so-called “doves,” have concluded that things can never be the way they were before. They think the U.S. must accept the failure of its globalization project. Instead, it should work with other players, above all with the BRICS nations, in order to bring the broken dollar system in for a soft landing.* The doves believe the U.S. should also adjust to the collapse of a single financial system into regional currency zones. While this strategy does mean losing in the short term, in theory it will allow the States to return to the big leagues of international geopolitics around the middle of the 21st century, thanks to its advanced technology.

Barack Obama, called “the American Gorbachev” for a reason, is the chief spokesman for the “doves.” In 2010, against the background of the “reset” with Russia, he planned to implement a worldwide perestroika. The biggest change was supposed to be the reforms to the International Monetary Fund announced at the G-20 summit of leading rich and developing nations. The U.S. was planning to give up control of the world’s finances to the BRICS countries by redistributing quotas at the IMF. After that, the world would have become de facto multipolar. However, Obama’s party’s new way of thinking was challenged in an internal putsch, led by Hillary Clinton. The same “bloody Hillary” supported the Arab Spring in the Middle East while serving as secretary of state. Clinton also provoked bloodshed in Libya and Syria, laying the groundwork for the emergence of the fanatical Islamic State. After leaving the post of secretary of state, Clinton mercilessly tore apart Ukraine through her protégé Victoria Nuland, just like her husband Bill wrecked Yugoslavia in the 1990s.

However, Obama didn’t win a Nobel Peace Prize for nothing. Through unbelievable efforts, he has managed to contain the fires started by the “hawks” more than once. Moreover, who became his partner in this worldwide “firefighting?” Vladimir Putin, the political moderator of the BRICS coalition. Thus in 2013, Russia and the U.S. agreed on removing chemical weapons from Syria, saving Damascus from NATO bombings. In addition, in 2015 the two presidents froze the civil war in Ukraine through the Minsk Protocol, keeping it from turning into a large-scale European massacre. It was Obama’s refusal to deliver lethal arms to Kiev in spite of pressure from the “hawks,” as well as Putin’s constructive tone in the Belarusian capital, that kept an extremely dangerous geopolitical conflict from turning into another Cuban missile crisis.

Overall, American “doves,” with Russia and the BRICS nations’ tacit support, have managed to put the raging warmongers in a strait jacket just in time. Furthermore, it’s entirely possible that the long-awaited meeting between Putin and Obama at the U.N. has become yet another step toward forming an alliance as important as the anti-Hitler coalition of the last century. In any case, Russia’s president has called for the creation of just such a union from the podium at the United Nations.

At the moment, it’s hard to guess how long such an alliance might last. Still, the fact remains: Russia and America’s positions are gradually drawing closer as they face the “new Hitler” of Islamic State fanaticism. That’s why Secretary of State John Kerry said Bashar Assad could remain Syria’s president for a transitional period. It’s also why Moscow and Washington have agreed to coordinate their efforts to combat the illegal Islamic State group.

Then again, Putin and Obama have another task ahead of them, even more difficult than the affairs in the Middle East. They must ensure a smooth reform of the current world order, providing the States with an appropriate position in the future geopolitical layout. This cooperation again takes us back to the period from 1943 to 1945, when Franklin Roosevelt planned to build a postwar world in close contact with the USSR. Back then, the Russo-American union was public, foreshadowing its rapid downfall. The death of the legendary president brought Western elites into power, elites who were betting on unleashing the Cold War. This 70-year-old mistake cannot be repeated today. So let journalists call Putin and Obama’s relationship a sparring match. Let top pundits analyze their gloomy expressions. All this commentary only makes it easier for the presidents to work together behind the scenes of the diplomatic show.

*Editor’s note: BRICS is the acronym for an association of five major emerging national economies: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.