Strategic Conflicts And Prospect Of Russia-U.S. Relation In New Century

Russia-U.S. relation, one of the most important bilateral relations in the current world, plays a decisive role in the political climate around the world. Both Russia and U.S. wield enormous influences on China. The research on the Russia-U.S. relation will help us to grasp the overseas strategies and their trends of Russia and U.S., which will exert great influence on the national security of China as well as on its systems of foreign policies.During the late stage of Yeltsin's staying in power in the late 1990s, Russia-U.S. relation reached its lowest ebb, and serious contradictions and conflicts over many issues exist between both sides. As the 21st century comes, both Russia and U.S. carried out the presidential election. Putin succeeded Yeltsin as president in 2000 and George Walker Bush took over the presidency after Clinton in 2001, thus Russia-U.S. relation enters the age of Putin and Bush.After the September 11 Event, Russia-U.S. relation enjoyed a short "honeymoon", however, along with U.S.'s insisting on implementing the unilateralism policy to dominate the world and unceasingly limiting the strategic space of Russia as well as Russia's recovery of national power, conflicts between the two countries become more and more serious, as a result, conflicts and divergence of views. almost exist over every important issues. Especially when President Putin had a lash-out in Munich on the unilateralism of U.S. and lodged a strong protest against U.S.'s insisting on deploying anti-missile system in Eastern Europe, Russia-U.S. relation dropped to a new low.Entering upon the new century, the overall trend Russia-U.S. suggests that the divergence is increasing gradually; the conflict is deepening day by day, the areas of cooperation are shrinking and the relationship is becoming worse and worse. At present, Russia-U.S. relation is in a state of "cold peace". And the basic situation features squeezing-out and anti-squeezing-out, infiltration and anti-infiltration, containment and anti-containment, cooperation and conflict, with U.S. in a positive and offensive position and Russia in a passive and defensive position.This thesis employs the methods of comparative analysis, analytic hierarchy process and theory of international political economy to make a multi-angle and level analysis of the strategic conflicts between Russia and U.S. as well as profound reasons behind them.This thesis is mainly composed of introduction and other four parts.The introduction mainly gives an account of the theoretical basics and research methods of this thesis.Chapter One gives a general overview of the development of the Russia-U.S. relation since the new century, dividing it into three stages.Chapter Two gives a detailed analysis of strategic conflicts between Russia and U.S. and their manifestation, dividing the major conflicts into three levels. The first one is at global level, including the conflicts and divergence of views between Russia and U.S. about cutting down strategic offensive arms and preventing proliferation of weapons of mass destruction; the second one is at geopolitics and geo-economics level, which can be summed up in three aspects, including conflicts and disputes about east-expansion of NOTO and missile defense system in East Europe, contending for CIS countries and further analysis of conflicts and divergence between both countries about some hot spots; the third one is at domestic level of Russia, carrying out an analysis of U.S.'s resentment and intervention against the development trends of domestic politics and economy of Russia.Chapter Three makes an in-depth analysis of reasons for sharpening the contradictions between U.S. and Russia, including (1) dramatically different values and violent conflicts over the national interests and strategic objectives, (2) lack of strategic trust between both countries and Russia's unyielding policies towards U.S. due to improvement of economic situation and recovery of national power, and (3) lagged trade and economic relations between both countries, as well as influences the personal factors of leaders of both countries have exercised on their relation.Chapter Four examines the prospect for Russia-U.S. relation, and gives an analysis of needs for cooperation between both countries as well as impacts the newly-selected presidents of both countries will exert on their relations.The last part is the conclusion.