The tendency to blame domestic disappointments on foreign bogeymen is not new and is perhaps better understood as a wave that periodically surfaces, then temporarily subsumes American politics. Indeed, this current reliance on conspiracy theories and accusations of unpatriotic disloyalty has been a feature, not a bug, of discourse regarding Russia since the onset of the crisis in Ukraine in early 2014.
U.S. Says Russia Failed to Correct Violation of Landmark 1987 Arms Control Deal
The State Department reported on Friday that Russia had failed to correct a violation of a landmark arms control accord between Washington and Moscow that prohibits intermediate-range ground-launched missiles. At issue is the 1987 Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty, known as the I.N.F. Treaty, which the Obama administration says the Russians breached by testing a cruise missile.
Is McCain Hijacking Trump’s Foreign Policy? (Patrick Buchanan)
“The senator from Kentucky,” said John McCain, speaking of his colleague Rand Paul, “is working for Vladimir Putin … and I do not say that lightly.”
What did Sen. Paul do to deserve being called a hireling of Vladimir Putin?
President Vladimir Putin tells West not to fear Russia
Russia is not a threat to Nato, President Vladimir Putin says. “Only an insane person and only in a dream can imagine that Russia would suddenly attack Nato,” Mr Putin told Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera.
Why Is John McCain Accusing Rand Paul of Working for Russia? (Daniel McCarthy)
Even at the height of 1950s red-hunting, Sen. Joseph McCarthy never took to the Senate floor to accuse a colleague of working for Moscow; he reserved his invective for the campaign trail. Senator McCain has now outdone him.
Russia isolation deepens, shuns German olive branch
Russia’s relations with its global counterparts have sunk to new lows as Moscow appears to have refused an olive branch from one of its biggest trading partners, Germany. On Thursday, Germany’s Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said that the Group of Seven leading industrialized nations should allow Russia back into the group in the longer term.
Key Democratic Officials Now Warning Base Not to Expect Evidence of Trump/Russia Collusion (Glenn Greenwald)
The latest official to throw cold water on the MSNBC-led circus is President Obama’s former acting CIA chief Michael Morell. What makes him particularly notable in this context is that Morell was one of Clinton’s most vocal CIA surrogates.
AP Interview: Canada’s Harper Says Russia Can’t Rejoin G-7
Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said Thursday that Russia should never be allowed back in the Group of 7 as long as Vladimir Putin is president. Harper said in an exclusive interview with The Associated Press that he expects the group won’t ever let Putin back in. He made the remarks ahead of his trip to Ukraine and the Group of 7 meeting in Germany this week.
Trump Deserves a Chance to Deal with Russia over Syria (TNI)
President Donald Trump has received the first formal pushback to his desire, stated on the campaign trail, to explore the possibility of working with Russia to combat Islamic extremist movements in the Middle East.
US Might Deploy Missiles In Europe To Counter Russia
The Obama administration is weighing a range of aggressive responses to Russia’s alleged violation of a Cold War-era nuclear treaty, including deploying land-based missiles in Europe that could pre-emptively destroy the Russian weapons. This “counterforce” option is among possibilities the administration is considering as it reviews its entire policy toward Russia in light of Moscow’s military intervention in Ukraine, its annexation of Crimea and other actions the U.S. deems confrontational in Europe and beyond.
UN Ambassador Haley warns: ‘We should never trust Russia’ (The Hill)
An ominous sign? Trump’s UN Ambassador tells NBC News: “Take it seriously. We cannot trust Russia. We should never trust Russia.”
Russia’s Ukraine Game: Will Putin Go All In?
What to make of the ongoing ceasefire violations and the constant remobilization and deployment of Russian forces along the border? Some have suggested that the same mindset that pushed for the rapid annexation of Crimea will inform the suggestion that Russia needs to consolidate the separatist territories in eastern Ukraine now before Ukraine has the ability to field better military forces.
Aleppo and Mosul: Two very similar battles. Two utterly contrasting media attitudes (Peter Hitchens)
If you recall the allegations against Russia and Syria during the Aleppo battle, they were largely to do with motive. Civilians allegedly died because they were targeted, hospitals and aid convoys, likewise, were hit because the Russians or Syrians were deliberately seeking to hit them.
Don’t Let the Crisis in Ukraine Damage Decades of Progress on Nuclear Cooperation
This December, the world will witness the 70th anniversary of a publication best known for tracking the end of the world. Founded in 1945 by veterans of the Manhattan Project, which developed the atomic bomb, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists was launched in the wake of the devastating nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, with the goal of informing the public about nuclear policy. But since 1947, it has been known largely for a metaphorical device it introduced in June of that year: the Doomsday Clock, which measures how close humanity is to extinction.
PODCAST: While Neo-McCarthyism Spreads, US-Russian Détente May Be Unfolding (Stephen F. Cohen)
Nation Contributing Editor Stephen F. Cohen and John Batchelor continue their weekly discussions of the new US-Russian Cold War. Cohen deeply regrets that the discussion must begin again with neo-McCarthyism, but it has become perhaps the most important factor in today’s American political-media establishment, and it is growing by the week.
EU Set to Roll Over Sanctions on Russia, Officials Say
BRUSSELS—The European Union is, in the coming weeks, looking to roll over its broad economic and targeted sanctions against Russia over the Ukraine crisis until late January, according to a number of senior officials and diplomats. The continuation of the sanctions are part of an effort to maximize the bloc’s leverage in pushing the Kremlin to fully implement its side of the Minsk cease-fire agreement, the officials say.
Russian Propaganda Can’t Beat Awkward Honesty (Bloomberg View)
Last week, Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland opened a can of worms by dismissing references to her family’s World War II history as Russian disinformation. That wasn’t entirely true, and in the current climate, history is politics.
Frontline Ukraine: ‘How Europe failed to slay the demons of war’
In 2014, history returned to Europe with a vengeance. The crisis over Ukraine brought back not only the spectre but the reality of war, on the 100th anniversary of a conflict that had been spoken of as the war to end all war. The great powers lined up, amid a barrage of propaganda and informational warfare, while many of the smaller powers made their contribution to the festival of irresponsibility.
Ukraine: Humanitarian Snapshot (as of 14 March 2017)
Clashes continue unabated along the contact line in all major hotspots. OHCHR reports some 129 casualties among civilians since the beginning of the year (as of 12 March). The highest record so far was in February, with 73 civilian casualties reported.
Russia and America: Stumbling to War
AFTER THE Soviet Union collapsed, Richard Nixon observed that the United States had won the Cold War, but had not yet won the peace. Since then, three American presidents—representing both political parties—have not yet accomplished that task. On the contrary, peace seems increasingly out of reach as threats to U.S. security and prosperity multiply both at the systemic level, where dissatisfied major powers are increasingly challenging the international order, and at the state and substate level, where dissatisfied ethnic, tribal, religious and other groups are destabilizing key countries and even entire regions.