Category: Blogs

Cables Praise French Friend With ‘Mercurial’ Side

By Katrin Bennhold, the New York Times

From Katrin Bennhold, the New York Times:  President Nicolas Sarkozy is an unusually solid French friend of America. He is also a “mercurial” man operating in “a zone of monarch-like impunity&rdquobreak–>; surrounded by advisers often too fearful to give honest counsel, according to leaked cables from the United States Embassy in Paris. “Élysée contacts have […]

U.S.-China Relations: Gone Fishin’

By Banning Garrett

When I was about eight years old, my father took me fishing in a stream a few miles from our ranch in California. After a long day, we came up dry. Dad saw I was disappointed, so he pulled into a fish farm on the way home. I eagerly dropped my line into a pond […]

A Swiss Alternative to Competing Visions of Europe’s Future?

By Kenneth Weisbrode, the Diplomatic Courier

From Kenneth Weisbrode, the Diplomatic Courier:  Calls for the transformation of Europe into something resembling a larger version of Switzerland have grown louder of late. Although European “neutrality” was a periodic Cold War bugbear, it now seems less offensive. Who would object to a prosperous, peaceful, stable and relatively liberal, multilingual polity? … The reason […]

International Subversives

By Arnaud de Borchgrave

Undressing electronically with eyes wide shut is what the world’s only superpower has done in a global striptease worthy of the Marx brothers but hardly a word has been written or spoken about the motives of the WikiLeaks’ chief leaker. Australia’s 39-year-old Julian Assange was 19 years old when the Cold War ended. His parents […]

Al Jazeera Questions the Lisbon Summit and NATO “Expansion”

By Al Jazeera

From Al Jazeera:  Is this alliance anything more than a fig leaf for US foreign policy? And what sort of relationship can it strike with reinvigorated Russia?

Romania: What NATO means for us

NATO has released new videos on YouTube providing national perspectives on the Alliance.

Russia to prevent Georgia rearming – deputy PM

By RIA Novosti

From RIA Novosti:  Russia will do all it can to stop Georgia from rearming, Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov said on Wednesday. "Our unquestionable priorities include preventing the remilitarization of Georgia and opposing the unlicensed production of Soviet and Russian models of military equipment by a number of East European states," he said. He offered […]

Belarus agrees to give up stockpile of highly enriched uranium

By Glenn Kessler, the Washington Post

Erdogan furious over personal allegations in Wikileaks

By Ibon Villelabeitia, Reuters

Putin Warns of Deploying “Strike Forces” if Russia Shut Out of Missile Defense

By Steve Gutterman, Reuters

From Steve Gutterman, Reuters:  Prime Minister Vladimir Putin told CNN television that Russia would deploy nuclear weapons and "strike forces" if it were shut out of a Western missile shield, adding punch to a warning from President Dmitry Medvedev. In an interview with Larry King taped on Tuesday, Putin also said the WikiLeaks scandal was […]