Russia Archive

Russia and NATO have been trying to “reset” their relations in parallel with the ongoing reconciliation between Washington and Moscow. Although progress along these lines has occurred, Russia-NATO differences over Georgia remain a major impediment. Belying Moscow’s hopes that the new American administration and other NATO members might reduce support for the current Georgian government in order to secure Russian assistance regarding Afghanistan, Iran, and other issues, the alliance appears unwilling to abandon Tbilisi despite Russian threats and inducements. NATO’s decision to conduct a major military exercise, “Cooperative Longbow/Lancer-09,” in Georgia from May 6 through June 1 has reignited the […]

The current global financial crisis is unique in that, unlike most previous crises — which started in the periphery of the world economy, and whose deep and long-lasting impacts were limited to isolated parts of the globe — today’s crisis is rooted in Wall Street, at the heart of the globalized market, from where it has grown and spread worldwide. As a result, powerful, globalized economies have taken the first and hardest punches. Although still a bit groggy, they are now struggling to get back on their feet. But while economists discuss how and when economies will emerge from this […]

I took a bit of a drubbing around the web for my post about President Barack Obama’s Prague speech yesterday. Matt Stone pointed out that our NPT commitment to “methodically disarm” (his words) is the flip side of the deterrence coin, while John Boonstra suggested that “bad timing” is a weak reason to foreswear the goal of no nukes, because “it will never be a good time to pursue nuclear disarmament.” I don’t disagree with either. In fact, having gone through Obama’s speech again, I find myself in agreement with all of the actual policy initiatives he identifies, ably summarized […]

Tom Barnett pushes back against the Global Zero goal evoked by President Barack Obama with what is certainly today’s quote of the day, and might even be the quote of the year: The system is nowhere near prepared or integrated enough to abolishnuclear weapons, and even if it was, I’d keep them on the sheerassumption that not everybody and everything I might meet in spacesomeday is going to like me. Anne Applebaum pushes back, too, with a point that is often obscured by the bilateral U.S.-Russian lens through which we see nuclear arms control: Plus I’m not sure the French, […]

As part of hitting the “reset button,” the Obama administration has decided to focus its Russia policy for now on the urgent need to replace an expiring Russian-American nuclear arms control treaty. The approach represents a reversal of the Bush administration’s stated goal of collaborating with Moscow on a broad range of issues, and also contrasts with the posture the Obama White House has adopted toward China. Unresolved Russian-American differences concerning strategic offensive arms control could impede this focused effort. And past experience makes evident that unrelated issues might easily disrupt the strategic arms control dialogue. The two strategic arms […]

It turns out the deal to purchase Russian copters for Iraq that I flagged last week is screwy after all, but not for the reasons I imagined. Sharon Weinberger explains why over at Danger Room.

What stood out most in President Barack Obama’s various press conferences I watched today was the divergence between the political theater in the run-up to the NATO summit, and the political substance that underlies it. On the political theater side, Obama acknowledged the French and German contributions to the war effort, while French President Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel declared their full support for Obama’s Afghanistan strategy. On the political substance side, Obama made it clear that France and Germany need to contribute more troops, and Sarkozy and Merkel said, Non, and Nein, respectively. It’s not that there’s no […]

This one’s datelined April 1, but DefenseNews doesn’t strike me as an April Fools kind of site. It’s a bit hard to unravel from the story, but apparently the Pentagon is paying a U.S. contractor to buy and modify to spec 22 Russian MI-17 helicopters through a UAE-based sub-contractor, for delivery the Iraqi government. I’ll be checking in with our resident expert on the Russian arms industry, Richard Weitz, on this one. I, for one, can’t make any sense of it. Update: Richard Weitz weighs in: It might be an interoperability issue. Given that the Iraqis have purchased Soviet- and […]

French President Nicolas Sarkozy got a side meeting in London with Chinese President Hu Jintao after all. France, like Britain before it, reiterated its longstanding Tibet policy — which amounts to public relations stunts to burnish human rights bona fides, while officially giving Tibetan aspirations for independence the shaft. For its part, China agreed to take the diplomatic high road and let bygones be bygones. Meanwhile, President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev got acquainted in a very lawyerly way during their side meeting. They have agreed to agree on what they agree on (START negotiations), while reserving the […]

Get a .pdf version of this report. Throughout the Cold War, Turkey remained a staunchly secular Western ally, serving as a NATO buttress against the Soviet Union. But in the aftermath of the November 2002 elections that brought the moderate Islamist Justice and Development Party (AKP) to power, its foreign policy orientation has undergone a gradual shift. The AKP initially emphasized Turkey’s European ambitions, doing more than any previous government to move Turkey closer to EU accession. Yet in recent years, the AKP’s drive for EU membership appears to have lost momentum, while the previous domestic consensus on the country’s […]