Security Through Cooperation - by Rose Gottemoeller

Book Synopsis

Russian officials and experts often voice the view that the United States was hell-bent on undermining, even destroying Russia during the turbulent period of the Soviet breakup thirty years ago. The primary US goal, in this telling, was to expand NATO to Russia's borders to isolate and threaten the Russian state. Rose Gottemoeller, drawing from the historical record and her own professional experience, refutes this notion. Gottemoeller argues that, to the contrary, successive American presidents were convinced that deep cooperation with Russia is essential to international security and stability. This conviction was born during the George H. W. Bush administration and took definitive shape during the administration of Bill Clinton, when he and his Russian counterpart, Boris Yeltsin agreed to develop technological cooperation that would be useful to both countries. George W. Bush and Vladimir Putin carried the conviction further, and the two countries made enormous strides on cooperation in outer space, counterterrorism, and nuclear energy over the next twenty years. While today is starkly different from the 1990s, Gottemoeller takes the lessons learned and considers what it would take--when Russia exits its horrific adventure in Ukraine and atones for the damage it has done--to resume cooperation for the sake of global security.

Review Quotes

"Gottemoeller provides an insightful, first-hand account of an era that, while recent, now seems remote: when Moscow and Washington cooperated to reduce the threat of nuclear conflict. Her insider's view of a golden era of arms control shows what worked, what failed, and what, despite today's hostilities, is still worth striving to accomplish." --Mary Elise Sarotte, author of Not One Inch: America, Russia, and the Making of Post-Cold War Stalemate

"I am glad Security Through Cooperationwill allow more people to know the story of this important era in US foreign policy." --PresidentBill Clinton

"Rose Gottemoeller is an extraordinary public servant. Her timely, extremely thoughtful book recounts all that was accomplished in post-Cold War arms control, the collapse of that security architecture in recent years, and the possibilities that may yet exist beyond the brutish aggression of Putin's Russia."--William J. Burns, former Director of the CIA, Deputy Secretary of Stye, and Ambassador to Russia

"Whenever Russia's war against Ukraine finally ends, the United States will have to decide how to manage relations with Russia for the long term. Is permanent confrontation inevitable or is renewed cooperation possible? No one is better positioned to answer that question than Rose Gottemoeller. In this important, clear-eyed book, she draws lessons from her extensive professional experience to argue that renewed cooperation is both desirable and possible." --Thomas E. Graham, Council on Foreign Relations

"Written by a giant in her field, Security Through Cooperation is essential reading for anyone wanting to more deeply understand where US-Russia relations have been, and where they may go. Rose Gottemoeller's tremendous experience, expertise, and leadership mean that anything she writes, I will always read." --Andrea Kendall-Taylor, Center for a New American Security

About the Author

Rose Gottemoeller is the William J. Perry Lecturer at the Center for International Security and Cooperation in Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies.