Description
Despite many obstacles, the leadership in Washington and Moscow must find ways to address security threats even as the United States pivots toward Asia. Moreover, he agrees with prominent statesmen like Zbigniew Brzezinski and Henry Kissinger that ultimately, Russia must be integrated into a Euro-Atlantic security system. The unexpected events of September 2013 that have resulted in a United Nations resolution compelling Syria to surrender its chemical weapons and a re-start the Geneva negotiations to find a diplomatic resolution to the Syrian crisis offers evidence that a partnership, even if limited and fragile, is plausible. A major consideration of the U.S. national security establishment must include how to operationalize the partnership. For all intents and purposes, the United States and Russia now have taken responsibility for resolving the Syrian crisis and in the process have reached a new chapter in the reset of relations. If they succeed in finding a diplomatic solution to it, further cooperation on other shared security concerns will follow. If not, they will take a turn for the worse.
About the Author
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
RICHARD J. KRICKUS is a Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of Mary Washington and has held the Oppenheimer Chair for Warfighting Strategy at the U.S. Marine Corps University. Previously, he cofounded The National Center for Urban Ethnic Affairs in Washington, DC, and in the early-1970s began conducting research on the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics’ “nationalities question.” In this connection, he began to write about popular unrest among the people of Lithuania. In 1990, Sajudis, the Lithuanian popular front movement, invited him to serve as an international monitor for the first democratic election conducted in Soviet Lithuania. Dr. Krickus has offered testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and has lectured at the U.S. Foreign Service Institute, the Polish Foreign Ministry, the European Commission, and other domestic and foreign venues on the Soviet Union/Russia, the Baltic countries, NATO, and Kaliningrad. He has published widely on these issues for academic and policy-oriented journals as well as various newspapers, including The Washington Post, The Chicago Sun-Times, the Los Angeles Times, and The Wall Street Journal Europe. For 8 years, Dr. Krickus wrote a column on world affairs for Lietuvos Rytas, Lithuania’s leading national daily. He has appeared as a commentator on Soviet-Russian affairs on U.S. radio and television on numerous occasions. He is the author of a number of books, including: Pursuing the American Dream; The Superpowers in Crisis; Showdown: The Lithuanian Rebellion and the Break-Up of the Soviet Empire; The Kaliningrad Question; Iron Troikas: The New Threat from the East; Medvedev’s Plan: Giving Russia a Voice but Not a Veto in a New European Secuity System; and The Afghanistan Question and the Reset in U.S.-Russian Relations. Dr. Krickus holds a B.A. in government from the College of William and Mary, an M.A. in international affairs from the University of Massachusetts, and a Ph.D. in comparative politics from Georgetown University.
