The politicians and political analysts expected this move and were prepared for it.
Alexei Malashenko, a member of the Research Council of the Carnegie Moscow Center told Izvestia: "A new U.S. Ambassador to Russia, Michael McFaul, is heading to Moscow to work with Putin. No doubt, Washington would prefer to see Dmitry Medvedev as the Russian president, but preference is not a stake. As a pragmatist, McFaul has said more than once that he sees no other partner than Putin for his mission in Moscow."
Malashenko does not expect any twists in major Western powers' policy towards Russia after Putin's return.
"Barack Obama has already said he will continue his 'reset' policy with the new president," Malashenko noted. "If nothing extraordinary happens and the current US president does not lose the elections to the Republicans in 2012, everything will remain the same."
The analyst believes that Russia and America will continue their cooperation in the Afghanistan issue and in their joint cuts in strategic nuclear arms under any president.
James Nixie, Russian and Eurasian Studies Centre's analyst at the London-based Chatham House, said the political and expert quarters in the West are not as concerned about Putin's return to power as they are about how long he intends to be the president.
Nixie reminded Izvestia that considering the extension of the presidential term in Russia, Putin could remain in power until 2024. It is clear that the situation in Russia and the rest of the world could change drastically over such a long period, the analyst said, adding that in the 12 years before 1991 none of the politicians or experts could imagine that the Soviet Union would collapse and that a dozen of independent states would emerge in its place.
Nixie admits there is no alternative to Putin in Russia today. The current opposition, whether systemic or not, is weak and divided and lacks the support of society. The Russian economy is in difficult, albeit stable, condition and there is no reason to expect new opposition leaders due to popular discontent in the next few years.
A repetition of any of the "Arab scenarios" in Russia is by no means in the interest of the West. The results of the spring revolutions have shown that moderately authoritarian pro-Western regimes are being replaced by forces that cannot be called pro-Western or democratic by any stretch of imagination. "A Russian Tahrir with a nuclear bomb" is much less palatable to the West than Putin's maximum long term return to power.
Kirill Zubkov
