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The Power Vertical

The Power Vertical is a blog and podcast for Russia wonks and Kremlin watchers by Brian Whitmore. It covers emerging and developing trends in Russian politics, shining a spotlight on the high-stakes power struggles, machinations, and clashing interests that shape Kremlin policy today.

Host and Eurasia Center Senior Fellow Brian Whitmore invites guest experts to deliver their insights and analysis in this weekly podcast. The Atlantic Council and the Charles T. McDowell Center for Global Studies at the University of Texas at Arlington co-sponsor this production.

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The Eurasia Center’s mission is to enhance transatlantic cooperation in promoting stability, democratic values and prosperity in Eurasia, from Eastern Europe and Turkey in the West to the Caucasus, Russia and Central Asia in the East.

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President Vladimir Putin with Deputy PM Dmitry Rogozin and Director General Vladimir Popovkin

NATOSource

Oct 31, 2013

Putin Dissolves Task Force for Missile Defense Cooperation with NATO

By Global Security Newswire

Russian President Vladimir Putin has nullified a 2011 order that created an interagency working group inside the Kremlin that focused on fostering missile defense collaboration with NATO, the Voice of Russia reported on Thursday.

Missile Defense NATO
Armenian president Serzh Sargsyan with Russian president Vladimir Putin

NATOSource

Oct 31, 2013

Russian Base In Armenia Signals Role In Possible Karabakh War

By Radio Azatutyun

Russian troops stationed in Armenia could openly side with it in case of a renewed Armenian-Azerbaijani war for Nagorno-Karabakh, according to their top commander, Colonel Andrey Ruzinsky.

Russia The Caucasus
Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, October 23, 2013

NATOSource

Oct 24, 2013

US to Allies: NATO May be Asked to Assist in Destroying Chemical Weapons in Syria

By Chuck Hagel, Department of Defense

Today we held the first defense ministerial meeting in several years of the NATO-Russia Council.

NATO Russia
US has only two Coast Guard icebreakers, "neither in first-class shape"

NATOSource

Oct 23, 2013

High North or High Tension?

By James Stavridis, Foreign Policy

The recent rise in tension in Russia’s relationship with the other Arctic front-line states — all of which happen to be in NATO — doesn’t help.

China International Organizations
Prime Minister of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdogan, March 26, 2012

NATOSource

Oct 23, 2013

Turkish PM Rebukes NATO over China Missile Deal Criticism

By Hurriyet Daily News and Anadolu Agency

From Hürriyet Daily News:  Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan rebuffed intensified international criticism over Turkey’s choice to agree a missile defense deal with China, a day after NATO declared that it wanted a say in the decision-making process.

China Missile Defense
NATO summit in Prague 2002

NATOSource

Oct 18, 2013

NATO’s 2014 Summit Agenda

By Karl-Heinz Kamp, NATO Defense College

Instead of focussing on capabilities, on Syria or on issues singled out by individual nations, the summit should concentrate on those topics which are of overarching importance for NATO’s future in the post-2014 era

Cybersecurity Missile Defense
NATO Missile Defense

NATOSource

Oct 18, 2013

Why Russia Keeps Moving The Football On European Missile Defense: Politics

By Joan Johnson-Freese and Ralph Savelsberg, Breaking Defense

The Russian Foreign Ministry has continually insisted on legally binding guarantees that US missile defenses are not aimed at it and that would allow Russia access to sensitive aspects of the system.

Iran Missile Defense
Steadfast Jazz is designed to "reassure" and "deter"

NATOSource

Oct 17, 2013

Does Steadfast Jazz Reveal How NATO Members Will Respond to Crisis in Central Europe?

By Andrew Rettman, EUobserver

Nato is to hold large-scale war games on Russia’s border a couple of weeks before the EU, at an event in Lithuania, plans to take away a former Soviet jewel: Ukraine.

European Union International Organizations

New Atlanticist

Oct 16, 2013

What Next for Syria – Breakdown, Breakthrough, or Botched Opportunity?

By Harlan Ullman

The Obama administration is on the verge of botching an unprecedented opportunity. Prior to the remarkable joint US-Russian initiative that established a process to dispose of Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal, the outlook for the region was grim. The only certainty was continuing violence that will kill tens of thousands and displace many more hundreds of […]

Iran Russia
CSTO exercise 2010

NATOSource

Oct 9, 2013

Russia-Led Security Bloc Holds Joint Military Drills

By RIA Novosti

Members of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), a Russia-led military alliance of former Soviet states, started joint peacekeeping drills on Monday in Russia’s Urals region, the Central Military District said.

Russia

Experts