MOSCOW, March 3. /TASS/. Prospects for improvements of the U.S. political course towards Russia are nowhere in sight right now, believes Dr. Alexei Pushkov, the chairman of the State Duma foreign policy committee.
"The prospects for a change of the U.S. policy course are nowhere in sight now, all the more so that people far more radical than Obama are striving for power in the U.S. now," he said in an interview published by Izvestia daily. "The Democrats will most likely nominate Hillary Clinton for presidency, and just recall that she was one of the authors of the crisis in Syria, so you are welcome to make conclusions."
As for the GOP, the predominant outlooks within its ranks are those of senator John McCain.
"The U.S. has put itself on a track of the Cold War with Russia, and I don’t think the Americans would revise their policies even if Russia changed its position on the Ukrainian problem," Dr. Pushkov said as he answered a question about when the sanctions and the anti-Russian aggression might be over.
Today’s situation started budding in 2001 when George W. Bush made known the plans for a second wave of NATO expansion and the pullout from the ABM treaty, he said.
Dr. Pushkov recalled that the Bush Administration made attempts to draw Ukraine and Georgia into NATO but they failed then because the decision was blocked by the Europeans.
Vladimir Putin made a landmark speech in Munich in 2007 where he pinpointed all these contradictions, he said.
Moscow and Washington found themselves on the opposite sides of the barricades after the outbreak of crises in Libya and then in Syria, Dr. Pushkov said, adding: "All of that was before Ukraine.".