The political scientist pointed to the lack of resources from the United States to respond to the expulsion of Gorman from Russia
Bart Gorman. Photo: Alexey Maishev / RIA Novosti
The United States has no diplomatic resources left to influence Russia, so it is not worth waiting for a response to Moscow's expulsion of Deputy US Ambassador Bart Gorman from the country. So says a military expert, political scientist and development director of the Fund for Assistance to Technologies of the 21st Century Ivan Konovalov. The specialist expressed his point of view in a conversation with Lenta.ru.
Earlier, Bart Gorman was expelled from Russia. “Gorman was the second most senior official at the US Embassy in Moscow after the ambassador and a key member of the senior leadership of the embassy,” said Jason Rebholz, a spokesman for the diplomatic mission.
The expulsion of Gorman became known after the visit of US Ambassador John Sullivan to the Russian Foreign Ministry. It was noted that he left the building of the department after 15 minutes without commenting.
Konovalov recommended considering Gorman's expulsion in a general context. “It started with [former US President Donald] Trump. He launched at one time a situation where the mutual confrontation between Russia and the United States was expressed in influencing each other through diplomatic missions, ”he said.
According to the political scientist, the US response to this event will not follow. The reason is that the United States has no resources left to influence Russia, Konovalov believes.
“I think they will try to influence the Russian Federation in other directions. Do not forget, there is not only diplomacy between countries. For example, there is Rossotrudnichestvo and other structures that can be influenced. It seems to me that the Americans are ready to do this for one simple reason – because they lost the main war. And it consisted in the question “whether the Russian Federation will attack Ukraine on February 16,” as all American intelligence services, the American Foreign Ministry, the Department of Defense, and so on, or not. You see, people messed themselves up and what should they do now? Nothing,” said the political scientist.
Earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that Moscow was ready to send a response to US proposals on security guarantees on February 17. According to him, it will be published in a few hours after being sent to Washington.
On February 16, the US State Department announced that Secretary of State Anthony Blinken was ready to meet with Lavrov in “due time.” A day earlier, Blinken phoned Lavrov. During the conversation, the Russian minister stressed the need to continue joint work on security guarantees.
