Superimposing a coherent narrative where none likely exists in order to explain the policies of President Donald J. Trump is an deeply unenviable task, not least because of the famously mercurial nature of the President. In order to make sense of his policies toward Russia and Ukraine it helps to begin with the obvious: President Trump has set for himself the goal of winning a Nobel Peace Prize by the end of his term, as such, he will do almost anything to achieve it.

‘I hate reviewing books’, the young Zbigniew Brzezinski informed a journal editor in 1960, explaining that he found it ‘debilitating intellectually, demoralizing personally and destructive collegiately’. Might Edward Luce feel the same way? My review in NLR, he complains, gives an ‘inaccurate account’ of his book that reveals a basic ‘misunderstanding of what a biography is meant to do’. He argues that I fail to grasp the ‘peaceful means’ inherent in Brzezinski’s anti-Soviet strategy; that – contrary to my suggestion that Luce bowdlerizes his subject’s sharper formulations on American power – Brzezinski never spoke of ‘US empire’; and that I misconstrue his political commentary at the Financial Times. Let me try to set the record straight.

Despite the widespread expectation that President Donald Trump would end Washington’s entanglement in NATO’s proxy war using Ukraine against Russia, it is increasingly evident that the fundamental features of U.S. policy remain unaltered.  Trump personally has sent an array of mixed signals about his intentions.  Although he has pressured Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky to accept the reality that Kyiv must be willing to make territorial concessions to Moscow in any peace accord, he also has been receptive to Zelensky’s demand that Ukraine be given reliable “security guarantees” in such a settlement.  Indeed, during the recent summit meeting between the two leaders, the main point of disagreement appeared to be that Zelensky wanted a commitment lasting 50 years, whereas Trump was prepared to offer only 15 years.

In telling the story of the four murders, Douglass is clearly heartbroken, but capable of expressing hope, the kind of hope that comes along as one travels the path of truth.

For 80 years our leaders have been working on the weapons and the plans to exterminate the planet and kill us all. And they got very good at it. Professor Ivana Hughes and Professor Steven Starr explain in this masterful presentation what nuclear war really means.

After years of diplomatic effort to manage, placate and charm successive American presidents – and Donald Trump in particular – European leaders are coming to a grim realization: the United States is, at best, indifferent to their interests and sensibilities and, at worst, openly hostile to them.

Inspired by the U.S. seizure on the high seas of ships carrying Venezuelan oil, Britain and other NATO countries are now considering using their navies to do the same to ships carrying Russian cargoes.

By resuming nuclear testing, the United States would give a major gift to its chief nuclear rivals.

As the February 5 expiration date for New START — the last nuclear arms control treaty remaining between the U.S. and Russia — looms, the Trump administration appears ready to let it die without an immediate replacement.

It should always have been obvious that by making an enemy of post-Soviet Russia, the European Union and Britain were ensuring their dependence on the United States, and making themselves unable to resist even its most illegal and immoral actions – as demonstrated by their approach to Israel’s war on Gaza and the US attacks on Iran and Venezuela. [Read more…] about Anatol Lieven: Europe and Ukraine: Coalition of the Ambiguous or Lunatic Asylum?

The following passages from the British Parliamentary debates on Ukraine on 7th and 11 January can be read as a kind of appendix to the debate between Critic and myself posted on 10th January. They reveal very clearly the lens through which official Britain sees the world.

As the European leaders push for the Ukraine war to continue, they increasingly warn of an all-out war with Russia by the end of the decade, if not sooner. [Read more…] about ACURA Exclusive: Are the Russians Coming? by Peter Kuznick and Ivana Nikolić Hughes

Goethe once noted: “There is nothing more frightful than ignorance in action.”

Spheres of influence stem from the very nature of states and international relations. States will always seek to secure their interests by exerting influence over their neighbors, and the more powerful the state, the greater the influence that it will seek.

“War is back in vogue, and a zeal for war is spreading,” Pope Leo XIV said in a forceful address on Jan. 9 to ambassadors from the 184 countries that have full diplomatic relations with the Holy See. “The principle established after the Second World War, which prohibited nations from using force to violate the borders of others, has been completely undermined.”

Ukraine has lost an entire generation in the four-year war with Russia and, if the conflict continues for another two years, it will lose another one.

Cora, my friend and frequent collaborator, died in December at age 91. She was a champion of the United Nations and its mission to advance peace and women’s rights—and along with her husband, Peter, a brilliant international lawyer, she never stopped organizing to save the world from nuclear destruction. Unfortunately, in the last months of her life, that organizing became more necessary than ever.

The United States did not deny Cuban statehood during the Cuban Missile Crisis; it insisted that Cuba could not host Soviet nuclear missiles. Nor does Washington’s current pressure on Venezuela imply a desire to abolish Venezuelan sovereignty. These are examples of coercive security politics.

The National Security Archive at George Washington University published newly declassified verbatim transcripts of three conversations between Presidents George W. Bush, Vladimir Putin and their top national security advisers in 2001, 2005, and 2008. The transcripts contain a number of surprises and have significant historical implications…