Foreign_Affairs_-_03_2020_-_04_2020

Reality Check

March/April 2020 43

rife with corruption; and it is almost

totally reliant on oil revenues—hardly

markers o innovation and growth. And

yet Moscow has found clever and eective

ways to push back against an international

order that Russian President Vladimir

Putin correctly views as hostile to his

country’s interests. Through wars against

Georgia and Ukraine, Russia has man-

aged to not only halt those countries’

movements toward integration with the

U.S.-backed order but also create divisions

between Washington and its European

allies. And by spreading disinformation

via government-funded media outlets and

bankrolling extremist European parties,

Russia has exploited vulnerabilities in the

open political systems o its adversaries

and has sown polarization and division

within their electorates.

As a result, Washington and Mos-

cow are now locked in a dangerous

cycle o escalation. The United States

In Russia and China, the United States

now faces two emboldened rivals willing

to push against what they see as American

overreach. To make matters worse, a ˆerce

populist backlash rejecting core tenets o

the liberal international order has roiled

both the United States and Europe. As a

result, the uniˆed and powerful bloc o

Western democracies that once ampliˆed

U.S. inŠuence across the globe has

fractured, leaving Washington without a

crucial source o support in its competi-

tion with great-power rivals. And as

Washington’s global inŠuence wanes, the

costs o the primacy mindset are rising.

GETTING REAL WITH RUSSIA

One source o geopolitical change is

Russia. The country is in many ways an

unlikely impediment to U.S. primacy. It is

neither a thriving society nor a rising

power. On the contrary, it is a country

with an aging, shrinking population; it is

Here’s to great power: Chinese President Xi Jinping and Putin in Tajikistan, June 2019

SPUTNIK PHOTO

AGENCY

07_LindPress_pp4_Blues.indd 43 1/20/20 7:14 PM