Vladimir Putin decided not to attend the recent NATO summit in Chicago – although probably not out of petty pique at our president. Regardless of his sentiments about Obama, he would have attended if he had thought it was in his interest to do so. Now Iran has abruptly ended the scheduled talks on her nuclear program in Baghdad, affirming no interest in continuing this round without some lightening of sanctions up front. The next round of talks is to be held in Moscow.
If they occur, as promised, in June – before the US election – the most likely outcome is more stalling and no progress. But that is not because there has been no prior interest on the Western side in making big concessions in order to get an agreement. What Iran is doing actually amounts to avoiding being presented with a favorable agreement. The abruptness of the talks’ end indicates mostly that Iran doesn’t see it as advantageous to stick around and talk anymore, in spite of – or perhaps because of – the P5+1’s anxiety to negotiate a good deal for Iran.
As for Putin, his proximate reason for not attending the summit is obvious. Missile defense was – as always, over the last decade – to be one of the two main topics in Chicago, the other being Afghanistan. The collective NATO missile defense system for Europe was to be declared operational at the summit. It was. Russia’s main bone of contention with NATO is missile defense. Although Russia has been invited to be a missile defense partner with NATO, and has participated in extensive talks on the matter, there remain fundamental disagreements between the parties over how to operate and orient a collective missile defense.
Putin had no intention of being present for photo ops under a “NATO missile defense” banner – in spite of President Obama’s assurance to Dmitry Medvedev that the US would be more “flexible” about the whole thing after our November election. Putin’s reluctance is partly because Obama’s NATO allies have a different view. They aren’t interested at all in more “flexibility”: the Europeans, in their own special way, have actually been quite stringent on the need for missile defense, determined to go ahead with it for political purposes if not for the capabilities of the inaugural system. The initial capability relies entirely on US Aegis warships being stationed in the Black Sea or Eastern Mediterranean, along with an early warning radar in Turkey whose data the Turks – against NATO policy – don’t want shared with Israel. The vulnerabilities of this initial set-up are obvious, but for the Europeans, the point is the show of commitment.
Writing at NRO earlier this month, Daniel Vajdic assessed Putin as increasingly detached from reality. I’m not so sure it’s Putin who’s in that condition.
If Greece leaves the Eurozone rather than staying in and swallowing some very nasty-tasting medicine, who will come to Greece’s aid? The door will be open to Russia, in a way it wasn’t in 2010 when reports abounded that Russia offered Greece a 25-billion-Euro loan, but was rejected by the Greek leadership due to opposition from the EU and US. Russia is already keeping Cyprus afloat, and has for centuries had a national interest in maintaining the principal geopolitical influence over Southeastern Europe. Russia and Greece have begun a significant naval rapprochement – but that’s not the only rapprochement going on between the two Orthodox Christian nations. Russian businessmen promised in September 2011 that Russian investment in Greece would be increasing dramatically, a credible promise given the level of investment Russia (and China) already had in Greek infrastructure. As the Eurozone crisis rages – literally, at this exact moment – the second Greece-Russia Investment Conference is unfolding on the island of Evia.
The leaders of Europe have a problem. If they effectively force Greece out – a move that would be understandable from a fiscal and monetary perspective – they will have to outbid Russia if they want to turn around and buy Greece back. The implications for NATO are as uncertain as anything else. A NATO missile defense, opposed by Russia and relying on the nations and waterways around Greece? America has to be acting like the alpha dog to make that one work.