President Trump’s decision to launch an air strike on the Al Shayrat airfield in Syria confirms what had been only too obvious in recent weeks, that Trump, far from representing a clean break with the regnant foreign policy orthodoxy of endless military intervention in the Greater Middle East, has instead become captive to it.
Analysis
Where Was CIA’s Pompeo on Syria? (Robert Parry)
As President Trump was launching his missile strike against Syria, CIA Director Pompeo and other intelligence officials weren’t at the table, suggesting their doubts about Bashar al-Assad’s guilt, reports Robert Parry.
Obsession With the Russia Connection Is a High-Risk Anti-Trump Strategy (Greg Grandin)
It lets Democrats off the hook for their own failures—and betting the resistance on finding a smoking gun is a fool’s game.
FLASHBACK: 1997. Open Letter to President Clinton on NATO expansion
NATO Defense Ministers begin their 2 day meeting in Brussels today, Wednesday, June 24. To mark the occasion we are publishing the following open letter, sent to President Bill Clinton in 1997, that warned against the policy of NATO expansion. The signatories informed the President that they “believe that the current U.S.-led effort to expand NATO…is a policy error of historic proportions.” The letter was signed by, among others, ACEWA Founding Board Members Sen. Bill Bradley and Amb. Jack Matlock.
FLASHBACK: 1998. George F. Kennan’s warning on NATO expansion
NATO Defense Ministers are meeting in Brussels on June 24-25. To mark the occasion we are publishing George F. Kennan’s May 1998 interview with New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman. In it, Kennan foresaw the perils of NATO expansion, telling Friedman “I think it is the beginning of a new cold war…I think it is a tragic mistake.”
Terrorism in America? They hate us for our freedom! Terrorism in Russia? They had it coming! (Danielle Ryan)
Mere hours after the blast, commentators were referring to the attack as “blowback” for Russia’s foreign policy. This is not a word you hear frequently in the aftermath of terror attacks on European and American cities — despite decades of Western military intervention in the Middle East, with much of it engendering intense resentment among Arabs and Muslims.
On the Poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko (Katrina vanden Heuvel)
The “poetician, not politician” always seemed conscious of the Russian adage that a great writer is more than a writer—he is a second government.
PODCAST: The Death of Russia’s Great Poet-Dissenter and the Lack of His Civic Courage in the US Establishment (Stephen F. Cohen)
Yevgeny Yevtushenko, who died last week, challenged Soviet authorities for decades while Americans at far less risk remain silent in the face of Cold War hysteria. Prof. Stephen F. Cohen wonders why established American figures — in the media, Congress, universities, cultural life, and elsewhere — have not protested the Soviet-style abuses now engulfing US politics in a wave of McCarthy-like hysteria. They have far less to lose than did Yevtushenko.
Reconsidering Russia Podcast #6: Pietro Shakarian Interviews Fred Weir
In this podcast, Fred Weir, Moscow Correspondent at The Christian Science Monitor, and Pietro Shakarian discuss Russian politics and society, US-Russian relations, the centenary of the Russian Revolution, Nagorno-Karabakh, Ukraine, the American Rust Belt, and Weir’s experiences covering Russia as a journalist, living on an Israeli kibbutz, and working as a journeyman ironworker.
Stephen F. Cohen: Lecture at Fairfield University on US-Russian Relations
In February, ACEWA Founding Board Member and NYU and Princeton Professor Emeritus Stephen F. Cohen gave a lecture on the crisis in Ukraine and the state of US-Russian relations and the very real possibility of a new and even more dangerous Cold War between the two nations. Coming as it did in the days leading up to Minsk II it makes for relevant viewing today.
Putin Derangement Syndrome Arrives (Matt Taibbi)
Whatever the truth about Trump and Russia, the speculation surrounding it has become a dangerous case of mass hysteria.
Tell Your Senators and Representative: Escalating Rhetoric Against Russia Could Lead to Nuclear Catastrophe (RootsAction)
In 1963, the same year as his “I Have a Dream” speech, Dr. King pointedly said: “We have guided missiles and misguided men.”
The Sino-Russian Marriage
It may be considered a singular success for Western statesmanship to have brought two old rivals for power and influence in Central Asia…The US, especially, missed opportunities to integrate both countries into a single world system, by rebuffing reforms of the International Monetary Fund that would have strengthened China’s decision-making influence, and by blocking Russia’s overtures for NATO membership. This led both countries to seek an alternative future in each other’s company.
Recurring Foreign Policy Errors and the Decision to Intervene in Russia (Daniel Larison)
The intervention in Russia’s civil war is a classic example of how the U.S. can be lured into doing something unnecessary and dangerous in a war in which it had nothing at stake to satisfy allies on the basis of shoddy information.
NATO’s Neocolonial Discourse and its Resisters: The Case of Montenegro (Filip Kovacevic)
Filip Kovacevic, an Adjunct Professor at University of San Francisco, writes, that “pro-NATO discourse” has presented “NATO membership as the ultimate proof of Montenegro’s political and economic ‘development’ and ‘maturity’.”
Harsh Realities in Ukraine
Four months after the Minsk II accords, the Ukraine crisis continues to simmer, with occasional violent eruptions. The ceasefire in Donbass has not prevented some 1,000 people from losing their lives since February, adding to the previous fatality count of more than 5,000. Some of the heavy weapons that both sides should have pulled back from the line of contact are still positioned close to that line, and are active.
Diplomatic Give-and-Take Is Not a Sign of Weakness (The American Conservative)
The idea that Vladimir Putin is going to be cowed into submission by shows of U.S. military strength or abandon defending what he believes are Russian security interests is naïve.
NATO Ambivalence and Stashing Weapons in Eastern Europe
The U.S. Department of Defense reportedly has plans to place tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, and other heavy weapons in the Baltic countries and elsewhere in Eastern Europe. It is easy to see what this is about. It is an attempt to send a signal—a warning, of sorts—to Russia amid the continued tensions that events in Ukraine have heightened.
Dictator vs. democrat? Not quite: Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny is no progressive hero (Salon)
Alexey Navalny has become a media hero for protesting Putin’s corruption. But his own politics are downright Trumpy.
Trump’s Budget (Like His Temperament) Is Exacerbating the Danger of Nuclear War (The Nation)
Some experts have also pointed out that the fraught state of relations between the US and Russia only adds to the risk of a nuclear conflagration—accidental or otherwise.