New Obama National Security team realistic on Russia: Analysts

US President Barack Obama's nomination of veteran Washington lawmakers John Kerry and Chuck Hagel for his next national security team portend a pragmatic approach to US-Russia relations in his second term but few prospects for breakthroughs, analysts said.
Obama has tapped Kerry for secretary of state and Hagel for defense secretary at a time of sharply deteriorating ties with Moscow over a US law targeting Russian officials accused of rights abuses and the Kremlin's ban on US adoptions of Russian children.

"Pragmatism is going to be more important than ever on both sides, and this is a very good team to supply the needed pragmatism and try to stay away from an emotional reaction to any given event," Cliff Kupchan, a Russia expert at Eurasia Group, a New York City-based risk consultancy, told RIA Novosti on Monday.

Kerry, a Democratic US senator from Massachusetts, and Hagel, a former Republican senator from Nebraska, have both been vocal proponents of bilateral cooperation with Moscow on issues such as counterterrorism, nuclear nonproliferation, arms control and supply routes through Russia to US-led forces in Afghanistan.

But many of these issues are essentially "low-hanging fruit that was already picked" in Obama's first term, including the New START nuclear reduction treaty and limited sanctions targeting Iran's nuclear ambitions, said Simon Saradzhyan, a security expert at Harvard University's Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs.

"In the absence of a breakthrough in the old agenda, it's unlikely there will be a qualitative improvement in the bilateral relationship unless Obama delivers a compromise on missile defense," Saradzhyan told RIA Novosti.

US plans to build a missile defense system in Eastern Europe have angered the Kremlin, which says the system would provoke a new arms race. Both Kerry and Hagel have made public statements suggesting the United States would be wise not to let missile defense stand in the way of other areas of bilateral security ties with Moscow.

The current row over the Magntisky Act, the US law banning visas to Russian officials deemed by Washington to be complicit in rights abuses, and the Russian adoption ban is unlikely to have any immediate impact on key bilateral security issues, Kupchan said.

"What I worry about is that this kind of serious disagreement can over time eat away at the foundations of a relationship," he added. "If similar episodes happen, then my fear is that in reality, cooperation on vital national security interests will become more challenging."