Relations between Russia and the United States

The relations between Russia and the United States are characterized by diverse cultural and political contacts.

Russian-US-American relations

Russia	United States

Russian Empire and United States (1776–1917)

In 1698 there was a meeting between Tsar Peter the Great and William Penn , the governor of the British colony of Pennsylvania , in which he campaigned for support for the newly formed territory. Since 1763 there were economic contacts between the North American colonies and the Russian Empire . In the wars of independence in the 1770s, Tsarina Catherine the Great declared her political neutrality and thus strengthened revolutionary efforts.

In 1801 the first US Consul General was sent to the Russian Empire. In 1867, the United States bought the Alaska Territory for $ 7.2 million. From 1880 to 1924, after several pogroms in the Russian Empire, more than two million Jews came to the USA.

During the American Civil War , the Russian Empire supported the Unionists with two fleet squadrons. The background to this was the tense relationship with Great Britain since the Crimean War , which, together with France, had sympathy for the Confederates .

Soviet Union and United States (1917–1991)

Comrade Democrats: Ivan and Uncle Sam , poster 1917

The February and October revolutions in the Russian Empire in 1917 were initially welcomed by the USA. During the Russian Civil War from 1918 to 1920 they then took part in the foreign intervention against the Bolsheviks. It was not until 1933 that the USA recognized the USSR as a state.

During the Second World War , both became allies in the fight against the Axis powers Germany, Japan and their allies. At the conferences in Yalta in February 1945 and Potsdam in August 1945 they jointly decided on the future of Europe after the war.

They have been hostile to each other in the Cold War , Korean War, and other clashes since the 1950s . In 1961 tanks from both armies faced each other in Berlin.

US President Carter and Secretary General Brezhnev sign the SALT II disarmament treaty

In the 1970s, détente was approached, while different social systems continued to exist. At the end of the 1980s there were agreements on military disarmament between CPSU General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev and US President Ronald Reagan .

Russian Federation and United States (since 1992)

Presidents of Russia and the USA since 1992

After the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, relations between the two states improved significantly, which made it possible for US companies to do business in Russia. President Clinton supported Boris Yeltsin in fear of the communists' return to power.

Relations between Presidents George W. Bush and Vladimir Putin have cooled significantly since 2000 . The Russian administration rejected the wars of the US and its allies in Afghanistan and Iraq. As early as 2007 it became apparent that President Putin was not enjoying the decades of efforts to make Russia "a pillar of the peaceful world order" through participation in international institutions such as the WTO, membership of the G8 and an association with NATO could.

Vladimir Putin and Barack Obama , 2016

After the disruption of the European post-war order through the annexation of Crimea by Russia in 2014 and the occupation of eastern Ukraine by Russian-affiliated associations, there were sanctions against Russia and then Russian counter- sanctions . In the civil war in Syria , the countries have been supporting conflicting parties, some of them the same, and have shared the fight against IS since Russia intervened by stationing air force units in Syria in 2015.

In 2016, after Russia interfered in the US election campaign , US President Barack Obama imposed further sanctions on Russian diplomats in the United States. In response, the number of employees in the US offices had to be reduced to 455 and two properties had to be vacated. Since US visas were only issued in Moscow, Russians also traveled to the Baltic countries to obtain visas for the USA.

On March 15, 2018, the US imposed sanctions on five facilities and 19 people from Russia for a series of cyberattacks that the US government believes had been carried out by Russia against American energy providers. In addition, there was the presumed authorship of the Russian Federation for the NotPetya malware , which caused around one billion US dollars in damage worldwide in 2017, and the attempts by Russia to influence the US presidential election in 2016, which were investigated in a special investigation. Further sanctions followed in early April 2018. These were based on Russia's continued attempts to undermine Western democracies, its involvement in the Ukraine and Syrian civil wars. They affected 17 Russian government officials, the arms company Rosoboronexport , 7 oligarchs and 12 of their companies. Finance Minister Steven Mnuchin justified the selection of the targets by stating that the Russian government apparatus was working disproportionately to the advantage of elites and oligarchs.

On May 22, 2018, the Russian Duma passed a law allowing the government to pass import bans. However, concrete proposals that were initially available have been deleted. Matvey Ganapolski wrote about the dilemma of the Russian counter-sanctions that it would not be possible for Russia to sanction the West in a meaningful way; the West does not need anything, but even the extremely Russian Crimean Bridge was built with the help of the Dutch and by no means exclusively with Russian material. That is why Russia passed a sanctions law but “prohibited nothing”. But even this could only be passed on as a victory over the enemy in the media .

On February 1, 2019, the United States terminated the INF treaty signed in 1987 for the destruction of all short and medium-range land-based missiles. The reason given under Donald Trump's presidency was that Russia had violated provisions of the treaty several times. Russia also made similar allegations against the USA and announced a day later, on February 2, 2019, that it would also withdraw from the contract in July of the same year.

Web links

Commons : Relations between Russia and the United States  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• US-American-Russian relations European University Viadrina Frankfurt (ppt)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Oleg Yegorov: What role did Russia play in the American civil war? August 18, 2017, accessed on June 23, 2020 (German). 
2. ↑ Как и почему Россия помогла США 150 лет назад. Retrieved June 23, 2020 (Russian). 
3. ↑ Oleg Yegorov: What role did Russia play in the American civil war? August 18, 2017, accessed on June 23, 2020 (German). 
4. ↑ Сергей Варшавчик: Как Россия помогла Штатам соединиться. April 12, 2016, Retrieved June 23, 2020 (Russian). 
5. ↑ Two friends pave the way for Putin , Tages-Anzeiger, September 15, 2018
6. ↑ Obama and Patience , NZZ, September 5, 2016
7. ↑ Oliver Kühn: This is how Russia responds to the American sanctions. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , July 28, 2017.
8. ↑ The message understands the situation perfectly. In: Novaya Gazeta , October 27, 2017.
9. ↑ Julian Borger: US accuses Russia of 'deliberately targeted' cyber-attack on energy sector. In: The Guardian , March 15, 2018.
10. ^ US sanctions against Russia for influencing the election. In: Der Standard , March 15, 2018.
11. ^ John Hudson, Seung Min Kim: Trump administration imposes sweeping new sanctions on Russian elite. In: The Washington Post , April 6, 2018.
12. ↑ Green light from the Duma for sanctions against the USA (and other states), NZZ, 23 May 2018, page 2
13. ↑ Matvey Ganapolski: Death to the opponents , Ekho Moskvy, May 22, 2018