Ultraviolet Behavior of the Gluon Propagator in the Maximal Abelian Gauge

The ultraviolet asymptotic behavior of the gluon propagator is evaluated in the maximal Abelian gauge in the SU(2) gauge theory on the basis of the renormalization-group improved perturbation theory at the one-loop level. Square-root singularities obtained in the Euclidean domain are attributed to artifacts of the one-loop approximation in the maximal Abelian gauge and the standard normalization condition for the propagator used in our study. It is argued that this gauge is essentially nonperturbative.