A week from now, the 29 member states of “the most successful alliance in history” will meet to celebrate its 70th anniversary. Yet all is not well within NATO.
Analysis
Fred Weir: As Russia reopens, Putin takes a back seat to local leaders
Russia and the United States have followed similar arcs in their coronavirus lockdowns. More surprisingly, their governments have also been delegating authority for reopening in similar ways: by deferring to local leaders.
Riva Enteen: McCarthyism Redux
The National Lawyers Guild, born in resistance to political witch-hunts, seems to have neutered itself in the face of the new wave of manufactured hysteria.
William Perry: Who Can We Trust With the Nuclear Button? No One
The Cold War is over and all presidents make mistakes. Yet they still have sole control over whether to start a nuclear war.
Lyle J. Goldstein: The War in Ukraine Must End
Washington should seek a grand bargain with Moscow over Crimea.
Aaron Mate: New sanctions punish Syrian civilians for US defeat in proxy war
As Syria tries to recover from a nearly decade-long war, the US has imposed crippling new sanctions under the Caesar Act that target reconstruction.
Gordon M. Hahn: Fables of Ignatius
It is now important for every American to realize that he or she can get little to no reliable news from the US mainstream media on Ukraine, Russia, or even the United States itself.
Rajan Menon: Hypersonic Weapons and National (In)security
Hypersonic weapons close in on their targets at a minimum speed of Mach 5, five times the speed of sound or 3,836.4 miles an hour.
Paul Robinson: On Russian Liberalism
As I continue my research into Russian liberalism, I took another look at a famous speech to the Russian parliament by Prime Minister Pyotr Stolypin in May 1907.
Max Blumenthal on how corporate media manufactures consent for war and regime change
Max Blumenthal discusses how corporate media manufactures consent for hybrid warfare and regime-change campaigns, from Russiagate to Libya, Venezuela to Syria.
Asia Times: Warmonger paints Trump a peacenik
Bolton’s book bodyslams Trump but the excoriating account may ultimately lift the fallen leader from the canvas before a next round election.
PODCAST: What’s Left?: Russiagate
An excellent analysis of the ongoing liberal obsession. In a two-plus hour discussion Aimee Terese and Benjamin Studebaker tackle the fallout from the Russia investigation. They discuss the media and the blob, the way these institutions “collude,” and the anti-democratic implications that result: manufacturing consent for a securitized and anxious body politic.
Eric Levitz: Democrats Should Stop Making ‘Ukrainegate’ About Ukraine
Democrats should not let their witnesses (or vestigial attachment to Cold War politics) lead them astray. The notion that America has a clear national security interest in arming Ukraine is dubious on the merits.
Foreign Affairs: The Kremlin Fears American Disorder More Than It Celebrates It
The current disarray in the United States doesn’t seem to be something that Moscow would wish on its friend, frenemy, or adversary. In 2015, surveying the chaos in the world, Putin used a UN General Assembly address to blame the United States, asking it, “Do you realize what you have done?”
NPR: Former CIA Analyst George Beebe Weighs In On Impeachment
NPR’s Ailsa Chang discusses Tuesday’s testimonies in the impeachment inquiry hearings with George Beebe, who was Russia adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney.
Paul Robinson: The Russia Anxiety
It seems that scarcely a day goes by without a major news story which in some way or another portrays Russia as the international bogeyman…
Daniel Larison: The Imperious Caesar Act Will Crush The Syrian People
Sanctions advocates often cast themselves as supporters and allies of the people in the country whose economy they want to destroy.
Hunter DeRensis: Is Impeachment Exposing Crimes or Policy Differences?
Once again, policy differences become the heart of the impeachment testimony.
Edward Fishman: How to Fix America’s Failing Sanctions Policy
America increasingly relies on sanctions to influence the decision calculus of foreign leaders on critical issues—and in the Trump administration, even to try to foment regime change
Robert Merry: Elites Want Trump To Repeat All The Usual Falsehoods About Ukraine
George Kent and William B. Taylor Jr., in their testimony last week, personified an aggressive geopolitical outlook that is designed to squeeze Russia into a corner and trample upon its regional interests in the name of Western universalism.