Given all he faces, Barack Obama may be tempted to set Russia aside. We hope he does not.

Russian-American relations have disintegrated to a dangerous low, with the Kremlin increasingly acting to antagonize the United States. And America’s European allies have been in no mood to take their cue on Russia from Washington. A majority have resisted American efforts to quickly bring Georgia and Ukraine into NATO. The alliance, which cut formal ties with Russia after the Georgia-Russia war in August, has begun a“conditional and graduated re-engagement”with Moscow.

Given NATO’s declaration that there would not be“business as usual”until Russia withdrew all its troops from Georgia and canceled its annexation of two Georgian provinces, the re-engagement looks a lot like pandering to an energy supplier. But it also reflects the erosion of European trust in President Bush’s leadership.

America’s leverage over Russia’s behavior has been limited further by the widespread conviction among Russians that so long as they appeared to be weak, the United States took advantage of them. The war with Georgia was one result; the recent announcement of $140 billion in military procurement is another.

Mr.Obama does have a few advantages in dealing with Russia: He is new, and the Russians are no less intrigued by him than the rest of the world. Neither he nor his foreign-policy team can have any illusions about Vladimir Putin’s Kremlin. And Russia is deep in economic crisis. Mr.Putin’s popularity and power have been based largely on Russia’s windfall profits from soaring energy prices. ow the Russian stock market is in free fall and factories are closing, while Mr.Putin’s ratings slip.

Mr.Obama should signal to the Russians that he wants better relations. That would mean cutting back on belligerent talk and inviting the Russians to highlevel consultations on areas in which the two countries can quickly achieve cooperation - say, on combating piracy. Mr.Obama should consider renewing the Start 1 treaty on reducing strategic nuclear forces, which expires in December 2009. He could tone down demands for NATO membership for Georgia and Ukraine, especially since neither is ready, and review plans to station defensive missiles in Poland and the Czech Republic.

For every gesture, the United States would make clear that it expects a tangible response, starting with help in ending Iran’s nuclear program and continuing with cooperation against international terrorism and a withdrawal of Russian troops from Georgia.