Recalcitrant Russia makes USA go purple in the face again

The US Senate has set forth another initiative to tighten sanctions against Russia. The reason is the same: US sanctions against Russia should be tightened because of the country's actions in Ukraine and Syria, and also because of Russia's "interference" in the US election process.

This time, the authors of the initiative are chairman of Senate Committee on Banking, Mike Crapo, and Democrat Sherrod Brown. "Russia remains a hostile, recalcitrant power, deploying its military, cyber-enabled information espionage activities and economic tactics to harm the United States and drive a wedge between it and its allies," Crapo said. "We should strengthen, not weaken, Russian sanctions, and the president must work with Congress on a Russia policy that is clear-eyed about our adversaries and their behavior," Brown continued.

As we can see, the purpose of the sanctions is to make Russia friendly and submissive to the United States. The senators suggest imposing restrictions on such sectors of the Russian economy as mining, metallurgy and railway transport. In addition, they believe that the US should expand the already existing sanctions.

Clearly, the most recent move targets not only Russian, but also foreign companies that cooperate with them. The goal is to make such foreign companies either curtail or restrict their  cooperation with Russia to avoid revenge from  US Treasury and other supervising organizations.

It is worthy of note that Washington threatens to tighten sanctions against Russia on a regular basis. Earlier this year, Republican Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham submitted a bill to expand sanctions against Russia under the pretext of Russia's interference in US elections. The bill has not been adopted still, but Mr. McCain set out a hope that US Congress would look into the matter in the near future.

In May, the US House of Representatives passed a bill that stipulated a possibility of sanctions for supporting the government of Syria. The Americans do not even try to conceal their objectives: "We will continue to tighten the screws on the Syrian regime and its most prominent backers, including Iran and Russia," Speaker Paul Ryan said in a statement.

A few days later, Democrat Senator Jeanne Shaheen said that she would submit proposals on additional sanctions against Russia. "The foot-dragging on Russian sanctions has gone on long enough," said Ryan Nickel, a spokesman for Shaheen. "There's bipartisan agreement that it's past time for the Senate to deliver a strong message to the Kremlin."

The Russian Foreign Ministry has responded to the latest initiative from US senators. "They will continue exploiting the subject about the "hand of the Kremlin" - this is a part of their domestic political games."

The USA will hold midterm elections to the US Congress next autumn. Many US publications suggested that the investigation of "Russian interference in US elections" could be extended before the elections to the Congress. For Democrats, this would be a chance to obtain a majority in the Senate and in the House of Representatives. As long as the topic has become a huge hit, with "sensations" coming in on a regular basis, they will not give up on it. Interestingly, the new "sensations" touch upon Donald Trump's ties with Russia, whereas  "interference in the elections" is not even questioned - it has become an axiom for the Americans.

Obviously, if we resort to the wording from US senators, the United States of America is a hostile state to Russia. One can take into account hypothetical intentions of the administration of Donald Trump to establish, if not cooperation, then at least more pragmatic relations with Russia. Yet, it is impossible to resort to complicated internal affairs of the United States to explain Trump's problems. To crown it all, the White House does not even try to resolve the issue of sanctions against Russia.

Russia should respond accordingly to every anti-Russian move that the USA takes. If US officials want some headache for themselves, Russia may give it to them.

Anton Kulikov

Pravda.Ru

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