US Ambassador To Russia: Speech At Muskie Club Conference, Moscow, Russia
JOHN BEYRLE, US AMBASSADOR TO RUSSIA
SPEECH AT THE MUSKIE CLUB THIRD ANNUAL CONFERENCE
IN ARARAT PARK HYATT, MOSCOW, RUSSIA
ON OCTOBER, 17HT, 2009
Transcript by Dimitrie Ross, www.muskieclub.ru
Thank you very much. Ничего, если я буду говорить по-английски?
[Laughter]
Any problem? No problem. I don’t think there is any problem speaking almost any language before this group.
I want to thank Dmitry [Vishnyakov], I want to thank the members of the Muskie Club for this invitation to join you this morning. It really means a lot to me. As some of you know I am a big fan of the Muskie Club in particular.
When I arrived in Moscow as Ambassador, it was July, 3rd, 2008, I was very very tired. I have been just sworn in as Ambassador twelve hours before in Washington in the ceremony in the State Department, flew all night over the ocean, landed in Moscow, went to the Foreign Ministry to present my credentials and then came immediately to the Spaso House for the 4th of July reception, which is being held that day on the 3rd of July, as a new Ambassador and I met a thousand people in a space of about two hours.
At the end of the reception, and I think few of you in the room were with me, I was talking to a group of people who were inspiring me, giving me a lot of energy which I needed at that point because I was pretty tired. They were talking to me what they’ve done, what their experiences were. The problem was that I have joined the group in the middle and I hadn’t figured out who it was I was talking to.
So I said «Кто Вы такие? Какая это организация или группа?». And they said «А-а, это мы – Маски Клаб». Muskie Club? Я подумал, о каких масках мы говорим?
[Laughter]
Я не понял. Теперь я понимаю, что такое Muskie Club.
And I am proud of the fact that now there are over 60000 of American exchange programs in Russia. And I am consistently amazed at the wonderful, talented, creative things that these alumni, people like you, accomplish every day.
The Muskie Club, through the charity work that you do, through the professional work of the members, I think really epitomises not just the power of cultural and educational exchanges to build bridges and to create bonds, but also you really epitomise the diversity of talent and tremendous strength of the people that make up the Russian Federation, and the commitment that you all share to making your country and the world a better place to live. It’s really that simple.
And I know about very much from my own experience, because as many of you know I was in exchanging just like you in the 1970′s. In a very different world but I had the same experience of visiting a new culture when I came to Leningrad, lived in a dormitory, took classes at Leningrad State University and had my eyes open to a completely different world that I had only the slightest suspicion of before I came. That’s what this is all about. And that’s why I’ll always be a very very strong supporter of exchanges as not just a way to build bridges between societies, but to make people smarter and stronger, too.
As Dmitry [Vishnyakov] said I want to talk little a bit today about what I see as a very new and a very promising phase venturing in US-Russia relationship. And I want to talk about your role as alumni of exchange programs and the Muskie Program in particular, and helping form this new relationship. And then I’m very happy to answer questions.
I’ve been doing this US-Soviet, US-Russian relations for most of my life. And I have seen the cycles that characterize US-Russian relationship. I have seen and I have lived through periods in which the competition and the confrontation between the United States and Russia defined what the relationship was.
I lived through the Cold War. I’m a child of the Cold War. I remember very very well what it felt like to live here in 1983-1984 as a young diplomat.
I remember the 1950′s as a young child when the relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union was terribly tense and dangerous, I would say.
And I would say the period that immediately presided that we’re the one in now, 2002 to 2006 and 2007 was also the period in which the competition in the relationship came to dominate things. But I know and have lived also through periods that are the mere image of that in which things that we have in common defined the relationship much more than what separates us.
One thing I didn’t live through but I have personal connection with is obviously our cooperation during the World War Two through my father’s experiences which I’m sure many people are aware of here.
But I also remember the period of the thawed in the 1970′s when we managed to sign some very important strategic arms treaties. Next year we’ll be celebrating the 35th anniversary Apollon-Soyuz. And I would put the 1990′s in that category as well. After the collapse of communism, the emergence of the Russian Federation, the relationship between two countries was really characterized by a striving to put aside our differences and to build something new.
And I feel very strongly that we have entered into a phase like that right now. President Obama clearly wants that kind of a relationship. A relationship that’s built on mutual respect, that’s built on our mutual interests, with more communication, with more cooperation, and based on – what I heared in a meeting with President Medvedev that he had here in July, the discussion that we just had with Secretary of State Clinton, both with Foreign Minister Lavrov and President Medvedev – I’m convinced that the Russian Federation wants that kind of a relationship, too.
Better build it, wanting isn’t enough. But if don’t want it you can’t build it.
And I firmly believe that if Russia is going to be that kind of a country that I think it deserves to be, a leader in the world, a world power, then for you to develop your full potential then America is your logical partner here. For a number of reasons.
As I mentioned, we’re both world powers. We have world wide interests. We have world wide responsibilities. We trade around the world. Our cultures are tremendously influential. We face the same cross-border threats and challenges in the 21st century, whether it’s terrorism, or narcotics traffic, or illegal migration.
And we face the same global challenges on earth, like HIV/AIDS, like climate change. We have a tremendous responsibility as the stewards of the 95% of the world nuclear arsenal.
Russia is the world’s biggest energy producer, and we are the world’s biggest energy consumer. That’s a natural linkage. But if look at energy efficiency, the ratio is reversed completely.
America has the best cutting edge leading technology in the world on energy efficiency and Russia has some of the biggest needs. So there are natural bridges there that we need to take advantage of.
We are partners in space, exploration. I was just in Baikonur about two weeks ago watching the lattes launch of the Soyuz rocket and the capsule to the international space station with American, Russian and – in this case – Canadian crew. But what was interesting to me about that was the new administrator of NASA, the National Aeronautic Space Administration of the United States.
His name is Charly Bolden. He’s a former astronaut which itself is always good to have as a head of NASA. But he’s also someone who knows Russia and understands Russia better than any administrator of NASA ever before him.
Why? Because he was a member of the first joint shuttle launched we did in 1994. First time we put an American and a Russian in a shuttle and launched them on a crew mission together in 1994, he did with Sergey Krikalyov. Krikalyov is now the head of the Gagarin Cosmonaut Space Training Center.
Seeing these two guys, Charly Bolden and his friend, his crew mate Sergey Krikalyov, just sit down at the table as we had the first meeting at the new space working group in the joint commission which I’ll talk about in a minute, seeing those two just sit down and immediately get on to business, without protocol, without trying to figure out where the other one’s coming from, was really striking to me and a symbol of how far we’ve come in this relationship.
Because what to me has really changed the US-Russia relationship unalterably now and in a way that we never go back to the bad old days, is the degree to which Russian society has opened to the outside world, and the degree to which our two societies now, American and Russian, are connected to each other in ways that were unimaginable even ten or fifteen years ago.
In the areas of educational exchange today there are Russians studying, teaching or doing research at I would say every major American university of the United States, and probably just about every university.
You are literally everywhere in the United States now. Last year US government sponsored 650 Russian students on exchange programs. From secondary students who went to American high-schools on the FLEX program, which I love as much as the Muskie program, to American college, to college students who study at American universities.
The problem is that 650 is a pretty laughable number frankly. And one of the things that we need to focus on is the way to grow that to 6000 or 60000. And that means we have to be creative about finding money to fund this more.
But 650 is not a bad number for something that enjoys direct US government support. And we also send Russian teachers of math, science, English to train at American schools as well.
We send about 130 professionals last year on the International Visitor Program to the US in just about every field that you can imagine. Historic preservation, good governance, it’s a very broad diverse group. The Open World program which is still growing strong, with the support of US Congress, the Library of Congress with Jim Billington, and sent about 320 judges, lawyers and members of the academic community to meet their counterparts in the United States and talk about judicial reform in Russia.
And then there is the summer work and travel program which in 2008 sent 32000 Russian college students to the Unites States for the summer to work in the hotel, or in a summer camp, or as a life guard and make some money and come back to Russia with a better understanding of the United States.
What we’re finding is that the summer working program is very interesting. College students from Russia take part in the program for a summer, two summers, three summers, and we are discovering now that many of them are returning to the United States on their own and going to grad school, with either the money they’ve made, or having cracked the code how to find funding for their graduate studies in the United States. Completely on their own now. So this program has been a tremendous seed feeder program for the exchanges that we are going to continue to push through with the government as well.
And these students are cultural ambassadors. They teach Americans about Russian culture. In my home States of Michigan, most people if they have met a Russian it is because of summer working program. It’s because they have gone to a summer resort and they’ve been served by a Russian in a restaurant, and a life guard guarding their kids is a Russian. And I get this feedback all the time. Oh, you are an Ambassador in Russia? Oh, we met a Russian this summer. Remember Dmitry, we talked to him in Mackinaw City.
These kids are ambassadors. You know, too few people as you know in United States really understand what’s happening in theirs country now, understand what Russia is. So this exchange pushes out and broadens Americans’ horizons, too, in the way that’s really important.
So, there is a good foundation for building stronger relations between the tow countries. But everybody focuses on reset. What does the reset of the relationship really mean. And I get asked this question every single day, almost. What’s different now from a year ago, from three years ago?
Тональность. The tone of the relationship has changed tremendously. Not only are we talking more to each other, but we’re listening more to one another. When President Obama was here this summer in July, his meeting schedule with President Medvedev, the number of hours that they spent talking and listening to each other was about 6,5.
Six and a half hours. And one thing that’s interesting about this relationship now is that President Medvedev doesn’t put headphones on when President Obama is speaking English. He understands. He prefers to speak Russian, obviously he is more comfortable, and I tell you President Obama puts his headphones on for that.
[Laughter]
So there is an imbalance in your favor. But the fact that these two men were charged with such a great responsibility for directing the relationship between our two countries, spend that much time together, spent 6,5 hours together including dinner, just a dinner between two of them with their wives, is tremendously important.
And the Secretary of State Clinton spent three hours just now on a two day visit with Lavrov, and that was all in English, very little Russian spoken at the table, and then an other hour with President Medvedev. So we are back to investing the time in the relationship that you need to have at the high level in order for anything to be possible at lower levels.
The other thing that I point to you is – and there is a lot that I can talk about and I don’t want to talk too long because the Q&A for me is much more interesting – the other thing that I think really brings structure back to the relationship in an important way is the Obama-Medvedev commission. It’s the bilateral Presidential commission that they established back in July.
And that the Secretary Clinton and Minister Lavrov are the coordinators of. And when they got together just two days ago to review where we are on this, we’re really far along for something that didn’t exist three months ago. There are 14 working groups now. 9 of them have already met. And all of them have come up with a joint plan of action which includes a very small list of concrete things that they want to get done in a first year or two.
We are past the point when we are just sitting down and having the dialogue. Its what it’s all about. The dialogue has to produce results. It has to really produce some sort of deliverables. And the areas that the joint commission is going to cover – nonproliferation, counter-terrorism, energy, health, culture, – runs the gambit of the US – Russia relationship and will help us build back the structure that gets things done below the level of Presidents and Foreign Ministers.
Because part of the problem that we have in cycles when the relationship is defined more by confrontation is you have agreements at high levels that just kind of drifts down and brake apart at the lower levels. Because there is nothing to keep them moving.
We have built something back now that will help us address that short coming.
And as Muskie alumni, you play – to my mind – a very important role in nurturing these new initiatives that we intend to undertake in the frame work of this Presidential commission. These initiatives, the most important of those, engage more Americans in business, more Russians in education and cultural exchange. It pushes the people out. It takes the bridges and the context that we know already exist and shines the spot light on them, gives them validation at the high level, and most importantly finds more money, finds the resources to extend them and deepen them.
Why are you specially place to do this? There are really two reasons. First of all, as former participants in a rigorous academic program you are the best advertisement yourselves for the benefit of what that program, this kind of an exchange intended to produce. And I hope that you’ll use every opportunity you can to encourage other people to take part in existing programs, whether it’s the Muskie, or the Humphrey, or the FLEX, or the Fulbright and the new ones that we’re going to develop in the coming years. Because I am convinced that there are a lot of variety that we are not really addressing the needs now. So, that’s one.
Just be who you are and spread yourself. Secondly, you are leaders in business and education, too. You are successful people in your own right. And you can work to build bridges to foster better ties between the United States and Russia on your own.
One problem that I wish we could correct and balance that I want to work on personally based on my own experience is the imbalance between the large number of Russian students to professionals who travel to the United States and the relatively smaller number of Americans who are coming here. Now, there is a reason objectively for this and that is English versus Russian.
There are many more Russians studying and speaking English than Americans speaking and studying Russian. But in your contact with your American counterparts, I hope that you help introduce them to the benefits, to the good things that occur from the experience of living, working and studying in Russia. Every new tie, every new person that you recruit into this family strengthens the family. It makes the whole enterprise stronger.
And many of you are already playing a leading role in business and will play a lead in your communities. So I don’t need to tell you the extremely important part of the relationship and what make the relationship we are building now in the Reset period new and better is business, the commercial relationship.
We need a string and prosperous Russia. President Obama said it very clearly when he was here in July speaking to the graduates of the New Economic School. We need a strong prosperous Russia as a partner for us. Not because we are altruistic, but because it serves our own interests in a world where America doesn’t solve problems on its own and where it needs partners. We need the strongest partners we can find. Russia’s prosperity is a big part of our success.
Russia has a lot of advantages for American companies. When Secretary Clinton was here, she visited the Boeing design center just a few blocks from here, on Tverskaya, and was amazed to find 1400 Russian engineers most of whom were graduates of MGU or other technical universities working helping design the new Boeing Dream liner with their American counterparts linked up real time through the marvels of the modern communication.
You’ve got first class scientists here. You’ve got still a strong education system. It needs some investments, but so is ours. You’ve got companies like «John Deer», like «Microsoft», «Intel», «HP» that are successful here because of the wealth that they fund.
We hope that all of you will be part of the fight against corruption that we see becoming more a part of the political dialogue here. It doesn’t become a part of the political dialogue it’s not going to be address in the right way. And we want that not only because we want Russia to be a strong partner for us but because frankly it helps American companies and it helps create a climate where more Western companies will want to come here and invest, and make this a stronger society.
We are logical business partners. The trade, the investment, the technology, that helps Russia become stronger, also helps Russia become a contributor on the world stage that’s positive and constructive.
As Muskie alumni you’ve got a unique opportunity I think to help shape that future. Not just the future of your country but the future of the world. Because Russia will play a leading role in defining what kind of a world we are living in in the 21st century.
You are unique, you have lived in both cultures. You speak both languages. You know the traditions of both countries. You’ve experienced our both educational systems. And you work for a very diverse group of commercial, cultural, educational, government organizations all of which have a global scope to one degree or another. So you are all an important bridge in this interconnected relationship that we are really working hard to build, that we need to have as the foundation of a better and more peaceful world in the 21st century. Because that’s really what it’s all about at this strategic level.
And if Russia and the United States are working together on that then we are going to get there a lot sooner than if we are not working together.
I know that your discussions this afternoon are going to touch more broadly on increasing the private public partnerships that will help foster all of this between business, NGOs. I know that many of you had the opportunity to experience the American model of public private partnerships. And I am convinced that it’s going to be a big source of the resources that we need to find in the years to come to keep these programs going and to broaden them.
I hope that experiences that you’ve had will help you enhance that dialogue today and help us in government who are trying to build a stronger relationship to find both, the resources and the inspiration to take it farther than we would if you weren’t advising us.
Let me leave it at that. Thank you for your attention. And I am looking forward to your questions. Thank you.
[Applause]
