Why Should We Care About Russia?

Russia is in economic and political crisis, both the economy and the government have ground to a halt. But what direct effect is the Russian crisis having on the United States? What guarantee do we have that Russia's significant nuclear arsenal is being properly controlled as the government appears on the edge of collapse?

CBS News Correspondent Jane Robelot interviewed Former Secretary of State for the Bush administration Lawrence Eagleburger to put the Russian crisis in perspective.

Mr. Eagleburger thinks the first concern Americans should entertain is the future of Russia's expansive nuclear arsenal program and secondarily the potential economic impact the Russian crisis may have on our own money.

"It should have been one of our major concerns all along. Now if in fact there is any real danger, that Russia will collapse, this issue of a lot of nuclear weapons lying around loose could be very, very dangerous." says Mr. Eagleburger.

He says one cannot completely divorce concerns over the control of the nuclear arsenal from economic weakness because the longer troops and generals are not paid, the more compromised the nuclear arsenal can become.

As for Mr. Clinton's visit, at this point "it is nothing more than a symbolic gesture. Clinton and Yeltsin are both weak and compromise leaders." But at the same time, he says it would not have been wise for Mr. Clinton not to go.

"We do what we can to demonstrate we believe reform needs to continue in Russia. We can do what we can to remind the world that Yeltsin is the elected president and that if democracy means anything, you keep your elected president until he runs out of office."

Mr. Eagleburger warns against expecting anything major to come out of the summit he says, " On the economic front Clinton is certainly not going to be opening up the U.S. pocketbook." And as for Wall Street reaction to the financial crisis he says anyone "with half a brain" could have seen it coming, Russia has defaulted on loans, is riddle by corruption and has yet to form coalition type governments that can legislate compromise.

But Mr. Eagleburger says that people are overreacting to the economic influence of Russia. "The U.S stake in Russia is relatively small compared to our other major trading partners in the Americas and Asia. The Japanese and South Asian crisis are more deeply troubling to our economy.

What matters to us in terms of what is happening in Russia is that if there is a total collapse of the country what will happen to the nukes?"

Finally, Mr. Eagleburger says, "there is no easy answer to the way out of this situation. The more unstable Russia becomes, the greater the danger to our security. It's one hell of a mess."