Section: The American Interest (USA)
The Return of “In-Between” Europe
It is glib to argue that history repeats itself, but given the right circumstances, it can rhyme on occasion. Historically in Europe such “rhyming” has anticipated a new power distribution cycle, when power realignments combine with national aspirations to force course corrections that up to that point seemed all but impossible. Today we are on...
The Second Nuclear Age Updated
Rethinking Armageddon: Scenario Planning in the Second Nuclear Ageby Andrew F. Krepinevich & Jacob CohnCenter for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, 2016 Since the end of the Cold War, considerable intellectual confusion has emerged over nuclear weapons and nuclear deterrence. A central reason has been the tendency of scholars and public...
Toward a Global Realignment
Five basic verities regarding the emerging redistribution of global political power and the violent political awakening in the Middle East are signaling the coming of a new global realignment.The first of these verities is that the United States is still the world’s politically, economically, and militarily most powerful entity but, given...
Russia, Iran, and Inland Seas
American thinkers tend to look at naval strategy as ocean-centric. The seas that matter most are the ones that must be kept open to ensure sea lines of communication: the Mediterranean, the Red Sea, the Persian Gulf, the South China Sea, and the Straits of Malacca. Inland seas receive much less attention. The northeast corner of the Black Sea and...
A Steep Climb Ahead
Ukraine yesterday got a new Prime Minister, a young politician with a vaguely reformist reputation named Volodomyr Groisman. But despite the surface promise, Hannah Thoburn argues elsewhere in our pages, it’s hard to see big new changes coming to Kyiv any time soon: Though Groisman may indeed have good intentions, he is unlikely to have the...
Same Old, Same Old?
After over two rocky years as Ukraine’s Prime Minister, Arseniy Yatsenyuk is out of office. Though he enjoyed some early popularity as a politician who stood with the protesters on the Maidan, his support among voters had long dried up, and his party had become so unpopular that it could not even scrape together plausible candidates to...
Russia Hardens Stance in Island Dispute With Japan
Speculation earlier this year was that Russia, looking to diversify its foreign policy portfolio in Asia, might be willing to open discussions on its longstanding Kuril Islands dispute with Japan. Russia’s Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, put such notions to rest yesterday, reports Russia Today: “As far as the Kuril Islands are concerned –...
What Minsk Means
Editor’s Note: How do Russia and the West see one another? What are the experts’ views on the confrontation between Russia and the West? How do the pundits explain the Russo-Ukrainian war and Russia’s Syrian gambit? What are the roots of the mythology about Russia in the West, and why has the West failed to predict and...
The Dutch Revolt
The Dutch public, voting in a referendum, slapped down the EU’s agreement with Ukraine. OpenEurope reports: In the referendum that took place yesterday, Dutch voters rejected the Association Agreement establishing closer economic and political ties between the EU and Ukraine by 61.1% to 38.1% – with 0.8% of blank ballots. Turnout was low at...
Dialogue With Russia or Dialogue of the Deaf?
The Washington Post asked an important question in an editorial late last week discussing the nature of Vladimir Putin’s regime in Russia: does his behavior in office disqualify him from being a strategic partner for the United States? When thinking about foreign policy we should remember Samuel Johnson’s admonition to James Boswell...
