This was not what they wanted to hear because ever since Barack Obama had become president in 2009, the main policy of the US government toward Russia had been one of appeasement. The administration had even created a new word for it: reset. This policy was intended to reset the broken relations between Russia and the United States, but in practical terms it meant that the United States wouldn’t mention certain unpleasant subjects concerning Russia so long as Russia played nice in trade relations and nuclear disarmament and various other areas.
