Section: The American Interest (USA)
Italy Scuttles New Russia Sanctions Proposal
Forget about new sanctions on Russia for its bombing of Aleppo: the leaders of Germany, France, and Britain folded after Italy’s Matteo Renzi voiced his opposition. FT: During nine hours of talks at a European summit in Brussels, the Italian prime minister succeeded in removing a proposal for new sanctions that had been tabled by Berlin,...
The High Stakes of Ukraine’s Energy Reforms
The performance of Ukraine’s energy sector is critical for its security. Yet systemic and pervasive corruption in this key sector during the country’s 25 years of independence is a sadly familiar story. Officials at the highest level of various Ukrainian governments and their confederates have siphoned off billions of dollars annually...
In Ukraine Peace Talks, “Road Map” But No Breakthrough
The leaders of Ukraine, Russia, Germany and France met in Berlin this week to discuss a “road map” for implementing their beleaguered peace plan in eastern Ukraine. FT reports: Ms Merkel said the main progress at the meeting was to agree on a road map — to be completed by foreign ministers in November — that would contain sequencing details not...
Finland Faces Kremlin Media Assault
Russian information warfare is old news to Ukraine and the Baltics, but increasingly it is being deployed against Finland as well. Reuters reports on the view from Helsinki, where Finnish authorities have noted an uptick in Russian propaganda: Sitting in his office in the government palace – built for Russia’s Grand Duchy of Finland –...
Forms of Hatred
Odi ergo sum: I hate, therefore I am. Some years ago I wrote a book about hatred, about its psychological morphology and, one might say, its historical anthropology. I arrived at a five-part taxonomy of hatred in an effort to bring under a single unitary framework what we have witnessed of its manifestations in recent times. As you might imagine,...
Russia and Turkey: Read the Fine Print
For the past year or so, relations between Russia and Turkey have been through a roller-coaster ride. Mere weeks before the Su-24 incident in November 2015, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was the guest of honor at the opening of a sumptuous mosque in Moscow, said to be one of Europe’s largest—if not the largest. Not long thereafter,...
What TurkStream Means
Vladimir Putin finally got what he’s been doggedly pursuing these past few years: a gas transit route into Europe that bypasses Ukraine. The Russian President inked a deal with Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Istanbul earlier this week that would send more than 30 billion cubic meters of gas Turkey’s way every year. These...
EU to Extend Russia Sanctions?
Late this summer, the general consensus was that EU leaders would have a difficult time pulling a sanctions extension on Russia together. But what a difference a few weeks makes! Reuters: While the EU says conflicts in Syria and Ukraine need to be kept separate, the latest military offensive by Damascus and its ally Moscow on rebel-held eastern...
Grapes of Wrath
As the grape harvest season approaches, Georgia, a country that George W. Bush once called a “beacon of liberty” is today holding parliamentary elections that could serve as a litmus test for the country’s democratic development. The small Caucasian country, that after the Rose Revolution in 2003 managed to transform itself from an...
The Perils of Putin’s ”Manual Controls”
This article is the third of three essays on the possible collapse of Putin’s Russia. The second is here.In the study of post-post-Cold War Russia, Kremlinology has been superseded by Putinology, variously hailed as an indispensable tool or derided as a pathetic pseudoscience. This increasing focus on the persona of Vladimir Putin is in...
