The rhetoric seen at US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s visit to Moscow largely confirmed that US foreign policy under Donald Trump has moved toward the establishment mainstream. However, the visit also showed that the Trump administration is interested in taking steps toward de-escalation and has not been an avid supporter of sanctions against Russia, Alan Cafruny, Professor of International Affairs at the Faculty of Government at Hamilton College told valdaiclub.com.

       Rex Tillerson's visit to Moscow confirmed that a transformation of U.S. foreign policy has been largely completed during the last two weeks, marked above all by the adoption of a more confrontational approach to Russia. Tillerson's visit coincided with NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg's meeting in Washington with Donald Trump, who proclaimed that “NATO is no longer obsolete” and suggested the possibility of Russian complicity in alleged chemical weapons attacks in Idlib.

       The immediate cause of this dramatic and unprecedented transformation lies in U.S. domestic politics: Donald Trump's imperative need to make peace with the foreign policy establishment in order to salvage his presidency. It was perhaps always unrealistic to expect any other outcome.

       Notwithstanding the heated rhetoric, some very modest steps towards de-escalation were taken. President Putin indicated that Russia was willing to re-activate the de-confliction agreement regarding U.S. and Russia forces in Syria. Trump and Tillerson have so far rejected the increasingly strident demands from an emboldened foreign policy establishment for further military strikes on Syrian government forces, and Tillerson said in Moscow that the United States shares Russia's conviction that Syria's national unity must be preserved.

       Tillerson hinted that the Trump administration was not in favor of further sanctions against Russia. Notably, the G-7 in Rome rejected British proposals for additional sanctions on the basis that the United States had provided insufficient evidence to support the claim that Assad had used chemical weapons in Idlib.

       In the longer-term, Trump’s instinctive transactionalist approach to negotiations may lead him to seek compromise with Russia. If so, this will lead to a resumption of conflict with an empowered foreign policy establishment that seeks to consolidate its victory and, hence, greater uncertainty in Moscow.

       Views expressed are of individual Members and Contributors, rather than the Club's, unless explicitly stated otherwise.