Despite President Obama's wish to "reset"relations with Russia, the Washington-Moscow relationship has frozen since the end of the Cold War. Obviously, the lame-duck president would no longer waste his time leaving a legacy in his presidency by believing it is in his power to rescue the relationship with the Kremlin back. Instead, he is now focusing on Cuba and Iran.

On the issue of Ukraine, the United States and Russia have achieved what they neither expected nor wanted. The United States certainly wanted to protect Ukraine's interest to turn to the West, by accessing the EU as an associate member last year. In return, Ukraine hoped to receive both economic and political commitment from the EU and the United States, without weakening its ties with Russia. However, Washington didn't realize that its push of the envelope would, unexpectedly cause Ukraine to break up, as Kiev lost Crimea to Russia.

By absorbing Crimea into Russia, Moscow is sending out an unambiguous message – it has its peripheral security interest to protect, and is wary of its neighbors, especially former members of the Soviet Union that are leaning toward the West. In 2008, Russia was not hesitant to use force against Georgia, cutting South Ossetia and Abkhazia from Tbilisi, when it detected that Russians in those places "were being suppressed"by the pro-U.S. Georgian government whose president was educated by America. Despite its anger and sanction, the United States soon left this thorny issue behind, as President Obama was sworn into power a year late and keen not to allow this hassle from initiating his "resetting"of relationship with Russia.

Handling the relationship in this way must send out a wrong signal, as the Kremlin will now venture to "respect Crimea's referendum to join Russia."Once more, America has proven itself as uninterested in militarily protecting Ukraine, as it did six years ago with Georgia, since "neither Kiev nor Tbilisi is a U.S. ally."Thus, by failing to predict, prevent and reverse both cases, President Obama has consistently undermined America's credibility to lead, at least by protecting its allies and friends.

Some would argue that by seeing the stiffen stand-off between the EU and Russia, the United States has much to gain as it has successfully weakened both of them. This may have misinterpreted America's intention and competence. It might be true that the United States wants to keep everyone at bay, but never by paying a cost for its allies or friends to lose their territory. Possibly the United States would gain in the short term by seeing a deep EU-Russia gulf due to the Ukraine crisis, but this might never have been planned by America. The Ukraine crisis could just be an unforeseen and unintended consequence due to the lack of competent American leadership.

While the United States has been much hurt by handling the Ukraine disaster erroneously, Russia has been no less discredited this time, as many would view its absorption of Crimea as a rampant interference of internal affairs of a sovereign country. This might also be the first case of changing international boundary since the end of World War II through coercing or using force by a major power. The UNGA has to make its response to the Crimean referendum to secede from Ukraine invalid.

Russia's legitimate national security concern regarding EU expansion into Ukraine ought to be respected. Often times such expansion has been followed by a NATO expansion. Clearly America would not feel comfortable if the Soviet Union or Russia would deploy its military at the doorstep of the United States, as the Cuban missile crisis demonstrated. Therefore it will be sensible to perceive and respect a similar Russian security sensitivity, especially when the then Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych made a concession last February to call an early election, after which his sudden removal invoked controversy and confrontation inside his country, and between Russia and the West.

Despite Russia's own justification of its high-handed intervention, its international image has certainly not been improved. On the Crimean issue, China has maintained its position that Ukraine's sovereignty shall be properly honored, though this matter per se has its own historical background. With Crimea's change of status by external forces, Ukraine's sovereignty has been undoubtedly challenged. Thus far, Beijing's argument has won the respect of Kiev government and many others.

With the sanctions that the EU and the U.S. have pushed for, Russia's energy, financial and defense sectors have been undercut. Even worse, the OPEC members have chosen an inopportune time for Russia to play their oil price game. As a country that depends heavily on exports of fossil energy, Russia has been hit by international circumstances which may not have been meticulously choreographed at all.

But Russia could still hold on despite the fall in the value of the rouble. Realistically there is not much chance that President Putin will relinquish his grasp of Crimea due to Western pressures. Given this, he may not expect the White House to try to "reset"the bilateral relationship any time soon. Eventually, it is Ukraine that is hit most: by accessing the EU even to a limited extent, it has lost its territory.

The writer is Professor and Associate Dean of the Institute of International Studies, Fudan University. He is also a columnist with China.org.cn. For more information please visit:

http://www.china.org.cn/opinion/shendingli.htm

Opinion articles reflect the views of their authors, not necessarily those of China.org.cn.

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