... London. Here, the implication is that the post-Brexit UK is not even worth the candle. We shall explore in this article whether France is just huffing and puffing in a face-saving gesture or whether her apparent stance could have major implications for NATO and European defense. But first, a spot of history.
From Gaullism to Inconsistency
Alexander Yermakov:
Is France’s Nuclear Shield Big Enough to Cover All of Europe?
In 1966, France left NATO’s integrated military structure and expelled NATO ...
China now seems the most likely actor to take a position in the post-withdrawal Afghanistan, while it remains to be seen whether Beijing wishes to engage in a conflict that the USSR and NATO had difficulty in controlling before it
Afghanistan has been a priority area for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) since the 1950s as a result of the growing influence of the two adversaries, the Soviet Union (USSR) and the People’s Republic ...
... and asking for. Rare encouraging lines, which are mixed with hard talk and submerged in harsh rhetoric, can be found in paragraph 9 about NATO’s openness to political dialogue, its unwillingness to seek confrontation and about its commitment to the NATO-Russia Founding Act. However, the latter point is phrased in such a way that it can be interpreted as the Alliance’s refusal to discuss Russia’s concerns about the principle of rotation deployments, which in the eyes of Moscow in the past years de facto has become barely distinguishable from additional permanent stationing of substantial combat forces.
Additional concerns ...
... We will find out who will be part of ‘Greater America’ – like the US and Northwest Europe – and who will be on the side of ‘Greater Eurasia.’”
“The big question is where Germany will end up,”
he concluded, referring to the dominant NATO power that has embarked on the controversial Nord Stream 2 project with Russia, despite staunch objections from NATO allies and Washington.
Source:
RT
National Interest editor Jacob Heilbrunn interviews Ambassador of the Russian Federation to the United States of America H. E. Anatoly Antonov
Heilbrunn:
President Vladimir Putin has recently published a new essay on Ukraine stating that Ukrainians and Russians are the same people. He also indicated that there are red lines that neither Ukraine nor NATO would be allowed to cross....
... in today’s Russia. Therein lies perhaps the biggest vulnerability of modern Russia.
On foreign policy, the strategy is fairly elliptic, but it gives a hint of what the upcoming Foreign Policy Concept might include. The United States and some of its NATO allies are now officially branded unfriendly states. Relations with the West are de-prioritized and those countries ranked last in terms of closeness, behind former Soviet countries; the strategic partners China and India; non-Western institutions ...
... ground, in the air, or at sea—would push Moscow to defend what it cannot give up without losing its self-respect. This would almost inevitably lead to clashes and casualties, which would carry the risk of further escalation.
Should this happen, Russia-NATO confrontation would deteriorate literally to the point of brinkmanship, a truly bleak scenario. Red lines, of course, are not there to be accepted, merely acknowledged. No one in Moscow expects the West to accept Russia’s sovereignty over Crimea ...
... shrill tone from the Biden team preceding his meeting with Russian President Putin on June 16, it seemed realistic that both sides were lowering expectations in pre-summit pronouncements. In the days before the summit, Biden met with G7 leaders and NATO officials to create an impression of a united front against the "threats" posed by Russia and China. His spokesmen repeatedly painted a picture of an "Alliance of Democratic States" prepared to confront "autocratic regimes",...
... Initiative; and former Special Assistant for Russia/NIS Programs to the Secretary of Energy, United States
Philip Mark Breedlove
General (Ret.), United States Air Force; former Commander, U.S. European Command, and 17th Supreme Allied Commander Europe of NATO, United States Kathryne Bomberger Director-General, International Commission on Missing Persons, United States
Ambassador Richard Burt
Chairman, Global Zero USA, United States
Evgeny Buzhinskiy
Chairman of the PIR Center Executive Board; Vice-President of the Russian International Affairs Council; and Lt-General (Ret.), Russia
General (Ret.) Vincenzo Camporini
Vice President, Istituto Affari Internazionali,...
... remained of the relationship.
The Navalny poisoning in August 2020, his dispatch to Germany for treatment, Germany’s public accusation that Russia had used a nerve agent to try to kill the opposition activist, Navalny’s return to Moscow from Berlin in ... ... Economic Union, with cross-ownership of some of the main assets on both sides; a security architecture centered on the OSCE, with NATO and the Moscow-led Collective Security Treaty Organization partnering to jointly uphold stability across the continent; and ...
