American Policy Towards Russia: Framework for Analysis and Guide to Action

Since the collapse of communism and commensurate disappearance of containment as the organizing principle of American foreign policy, U.S. foreign policymakers have lacked a unifying framework for interpreting the international system or a grand strategy for guiding U.S. actions in this system. Lacking a grand strategy, American motivations and objectives in international affairs often seem ambiguous, confused, if not slyly

sinister, to outside observers.