Section: The American Interest (USA)
Team Trump at the UN: Still Not Russian Patsies
The U.S. and Russia are once again clashing in the Security Council, with UN Ambassador Nikki Haley laying into Russia for vetoing a resolution to sanction Syria for its use of chemical weapons. The Wall Street Journal reports: The U.S. on Tuesday accused Russia of covering for Syria’s use of chemical weapons, and Russia accused the U.S. of...
Wilders Looms Large In Dutch Elections
The Dutch elections planned for March 15 are being closely watched as another test of the strength of European populism, as the far-right provocateur Geert van Wilders—whose PVV party is currently leading in the polls—seeks to take power in a country once seen as a haven of cosmopolitan liberalism. Whether or not Wilders wins, however, readouts...
Europe Faces the Demolition Man
In his “We Shall Fight Them on the Beaches” speech to the House of Commons in June 1940, Winston Churchill orated: “The New World, with all its power and might,” would “step forth to the rescue and the liberation of the old.”America did step forth to save Europe—and again, when Stalin tried to bag the Western half. And now? Is the savior turning...
Trump’s Ratings Slump in Russia
Donald Trump’s ratings in Russia have slumped. Or, better put, they have been artificially lowered, after the Kremlin ordered state-controlled TV channels to avoid excessive mentions of the 45th American President. As a result, Russian TV now talks about Trump four times less then before.Earlier this month, citing three sources familiar...
Trump Isn’t Sounding Like a Russian Mole
With his latest effusive remarks to Reuters on the importance of expanding the U.S. nuclear arsenal, President Donald Trump has sent the press into a panic once again.What the press has largely ignored about Trump’s latest pronouncement is an obvious truth that undermines its own narrative: someone who was safely in Vladimir Putin’s...
Survival in the Trumpian World
The Russian state presents perhaps a unique case in modern history of a state surviving by means of paradox—turning weakness into strength, tactics into strategy, exceptions into rules, defeat into victory, and a civilizational foe into a source of life. It should be clear by now that the Trumpian world—even if we are still not sure precisely...
Firtash To Face Extradition
Dmitry Firtash, a Ukrainian oligarch with ties to former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort, could soon face extradition to the United States on bribery charges. Financial Times: A Vienna court on Tuesday granted a request to extradite Dmitry Firtash, one of Ukraine’s richest and most powerful men, to the US on bribery charges, setting...
Understanding Putin’s Men
The term “Kremlinology,” coined during the Soviet era, has been permanently reinstated in our daily vocabularies. Since it is practically impossible to calculate the Kremlin’s next moves based on its public statements or the “rules of the game,” interpreting the noise coming from the “bulldog fight under the rug” has once more become an...
Team Trump Talks Tough on Russia
As headlines about former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn’s contacts with Russia keep the presses rolling at home, senior Trump officials are engaged in a busy day of diplomacy with their Russian counterparts abroad. But despite the frenzied speculation about Trump’s Russia ties, the Administration’s early diplomatic...
Donald Trump and the Perils of Charisma
Whatever one may want to say about Donald Trump’s style of political leadership, it can plausibly be described as charismatic—grounded neither in tradition nor in rational interest, it depends on the continuing faith in the leader by the mass of followers. Because of this it is inevitably brittle. One way of making it less so is to...
