Tag: NATO

NEWSWATCH: “NATO’s Breedlove Calls for Sharper Focus on Russia Ahead of Departure. Gen. Philip Breedlove says U.S. needs more reconnaissance satellites amid Russian threat.” – Wall Street Journal

Europe, EU, JRL NewsBlog, Military, NATO, Spies, Spy Allegations, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Philip Breedlove file photo

The U.S. has too few intelligence assets focused on the threat from Russia and should concentrate its technical capabilities on Moscow’s growing military might, NATO’s departing supreme allied commander said. The U.S. has begun to build up the number of intelligence analysts examining Russia, which stood at 13,000 at the height of the Cold War before dipping to a low […]

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NEWSWATCH: “Lawmakers look to get tough on Russia” – The Hill

JRL NewsBlog, Military, NATO, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
U.S. Capitol in Bright Sunlight

Russian aggression will be high on lawmakers’ minds when the House Armed Services Committee meets Wednesday to mark up its annual defense policy bill. … the Russians have buzzed a U.S. Navy destroyer, barrel rolled over a U.S. reconnaissance plane and warned the United States to steer clear of its territory. … committee members say there will be plenty in […]

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NEWSLINK Russia Direct: “Reasons to be hopeful after the Russia-NATO Summit. Russia and NATO renewed their dialogue for the first time since the beginning of the Ukraine crisis, but the talks failed to produce any results. However, the very fact that the summit took place means a lot and gives reason to hope that the two sides can eventually find a compromise.”

NATO, Newslinks, Ukraine, Russo-Ukrainian War
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RBTH: Can Russia stomach Ukraine and Georgia becoming NATO ‘associates’?

Georgia, NATO, Ukraine, Russo-Ukrainian War
NATO Meeting file photo

The upcoming NATO summit in Warsaw (8-9 July 2016) will be hallmarked by Ukraine and Georgia’s elevation to a still-elusive status of “associate partners.” While the move could be interpreted as one step closer to full membership, Moscow military experts view it as lip service to keep the two countries, going through a turbulent transitional period, in the Western alliance’s […]

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VIDEO & ARTICLE: The Kremlin’s Spin, NATO’s Reality

NATO
NATO Meeting file photo

(RFE/RL – rferl.org – The Daily Vertical: Brian Whitmore – April 20, 2016) The Kremlin and its surrogates are spinning today’s meeting of the NATO-Russia Council as the end of Moscow’s isolation. In Brussels, it is viewed as a technical meeting to put safeguards in place to prevent an accidental conflict from breaking out amid rising tensions. The Kremlin says […]

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NEWSLINK RBTH/Gazeta.ru: “Russian general: ‘We never send notes to the U.S. State Department.’ General Pyotr Deinekin, former chief of the Russian air force, talks about the latest incidents involving Russian warplanes and U.S. ships and aircraft”

Baltics, International Law, Military, Newslinks, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Russian Jet Buzzing U.S. Navy Destroyer, adapted from U.S. Navy photo » Read more
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NEWSWATCH: “Russia’s Perpetual Geopolitics. Putin Returns to the Historical Pattern.” – Foreign Affairs/Stephen Kotkin

Europe, EU, Foreign Policy, Security, Visas, History, Soviet Union, JRL NewsBlog, NATO, Russia & the West, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Map of Commonwealth of Independent States, European Portion

For half a millennium, Russian foreign policy has been characterized by soaring ambitions that have exceeded the country’s capabilities. Beginning with … Ivan the Terrible … Russia managed to expand at an average rate of 50 square miles per day for hundreds of years, eventually covering one-sixth of the earth’s landmass. * * *  Throughout, the country has been haunted […]

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Polish Minister Says Russia More Dangerous Than Islamic State

Europe, EU, Military, NATO, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Russian Jet Buzzing U.S. Navy Destroyer, adapted from U.S. Navy photo

(RFE/RL – April 15, 2016) Poland’s foreign minister has said that Russia is an “existential threat” to European countries and is more dangerous than the Islamic State (IS) militant group. Speaking at a conference in Bratislava on April 15, Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski said “Russia’s activity is a sort of existential threat because this activity can destroy countries.” The migration […]

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Interfax: Less than half of Ukrainians support NATO membership – poll

NATO, Ukraine, Russo-Ukrainian War
Map of Ukraine, Including Crimea, and Neighbors, Including Russia

(Interfax – April 16, 2016) Only 45% of the population support the idea of Ukraine’s joining NATO, as is seen from a public opinion poll. Asked how they would vote if a referendum on Ukraine’s accession to NATO were held today, 45% of those polled said they would vote in favor of NATO membership, 30% would vote against it, 16% […]

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Interfax: Russia lost faith in Western leadership due to abuse of its trust – Pushkov

NATO, Russia & the West
Alexei Pushkov file photo

MOSCOW. April 8 (Interfax) – Russia has stopped seeing the West as a leader because the West has abused Russia’s readiness for partnership, Alexei Pushkov, head of the State Duma committee on international affairs, said. “Russia was not ready to see the West as a leader by the middle of the first decade of the 2000s, specifically, because the West […]

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RBTH: NATO reinforcement: Why turn Europe into a theater of potential war?

NATO
Europe Map

Washington and London have intensified their anti-Kremlin rhetoric with recent statements, followed by the announcement that the U.S. is to deploy three fully-manned military brigades to Eastern Europe to counter Russian “aggression.” Foreign affairs analyst Vladimir Mikheev says this is reckless and short-sighted action that only heightens the risk of conflict in Europe. (Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – […]

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It Isn’t Time to Normalize With Russia Yet

Foreign Policy, Security, Visas, Middle East, North Africa, Syria, Ukraine, Russo-Ukrainian War, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
File Photo of Kremlin Tower, St. Basil's, Red Square at Night

(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Marc Champion – March 22, 2016) Marc Champion writes editorials on international affairs. He was previously Istanbul bureau chief for the Wall Street Journal. He was also an editor at the Financial Times, the editor-in-chief of the Moscow Times and a correspondent for the Independent in Washington, the Balkans and Moscow. He is based in London. […]

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NEWSWATCH Reuters: “Risk of nuclear war in Europe growing, warns Russian ex-minister [Igor Ivanov]”

Europe, EU, JRL NewsBlog, NATO, Nuclear, Missile Defense, Ukraine, Russo-Ukrainian War, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Iskander Missile with Launch file photo

The East-West standoff over the Ukraine crisis has brought the threat of nuclear war in Europe closer than at any time since the 1980s…. said Igor Ivanov, Russia’s foreign minister from 1998 to 2004 and now head of a Moscow-based think-tank founded by the Russian government. … Russia and the United States have cut their nuclear arsenals [but] the pace […]

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NEWSWATCH: “RUSSIAN HYBRID WARFARE AND OTHER DARK ARTS” – War on the Rocks/Michael Kofman

Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Europe Map

  Following Russia’s annexation of Crimea, hybrid warfare has become conversational short form in the West for describing Moscow’s sneaky ways of fighting war. … a dangerous Kremlin innovation the West must learn to grapple with. … the word has mutated from describing how Moscow was fighting its war in Ukraine to incorporating all the various elements of Russian influence […]

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Hawks See Obama’s NATO Pick as Soft on Russia

NATO, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
File Photo of Rose Gottemoeller Gesturing, Sitting Behind Placard Reading United States of America

(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Josh Rogin – March 11, 2016) At a crucial moment in the U.S. relationship with Europe, President Barack Obama has chosen a No. 2 for NATO whom some Republican lawmakers see as the face of a wrongheaded approach to Russia. On Tuesday, the Obama administration informed NATO allies that it will recommend the undersecretary of state […]

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Obama: Ukraine ‘Vulnerable’ To Russian ‘Military Domination’ No Matter What U.S. Does

Middle East, North Africa, Syria, Ukraine, Russo-Ukrainian War, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Map of Ukraine, Including Crimea, and Neighbors, Including Russia

(RFE/RL – rferl.org – March 10, 2016) U.S. President Barack Obama said that Ukraine “is going to be vulnerable to military domination by Russia no matter what” the United States does. In one of a series of interviews published on March 10 that formed the basis of an article in The Atlantic magazine, Obama said that Ukraine was clearly a […]

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Leaked NATO report praises ‘professionalism’ of Russia’s air force in Syria

Media, Internet, Social Media, Television, Military, NATO

Russian mass media have been discussing a classified NATO report that praised the performance of the Russian aerospace contingent in Syria. (Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – NIKOLAI SHEVCHENKO, RBTH – March 9, 2016) A number of Russian publications have referred to a leaked NATO document that allegedly acknowledged the “efficiency” and “professionalism” of Russia’s aerospace forces in Syria. […]

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NEWSWATCH “Ukraine will not join EU, NATO for another 20-25 years, Juncker says” – DPA

Europe, EU, JRL NewsBlog, NATO, Ukraine, Russo-Ukrainian War
EU Map

The push for closer ties between Ukraine and the EU lies at the heart of the current crisis … triggered by protests in 2013 over a failed attempt to finalize … EU-Ukraine free trade …. The agreement has since been signed and implemented, while the EU is paving the way for Ukrainian citizens to be able to visit the bloc […]

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What’s behind Ankara’s conciliatory overtures to Moscow?

Middle East, North Africa, Turkey
Turkey map

Amidst the almost frozen interaction between Turkey and Russia, top government officials in Ankara are sending signals to Moscow of their readiness to mend the ruptured relationship. Can these suggestions be taken at face value and what are the chances of a reconciliation? (Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – VLADIMIR MIKHEEV, SPECIAL TO RBTH – March 2, 2016) The […]

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Russia, Syria Said Using Migrant Crisis As ‘Weapon’ Against West

Europe, EU, Syria, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Syria Map

(RFE/RL – rferl.org – March 2, 2016) NATO’s top commander warned that Russia and Syria have turned the refugee crisis into a “weapon” against the West at a time when it lacks resources to counter a “resurgent, aggressive” Russia. U.S. Air Force General Philip Breedlove, who commands the 28-member military alliance, said the flow of hundreds of thousands of migrants […]

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Russians Not Ready to Forgive Turkey for Downed Plane – Poll

Europe, EU, Middle East, North Africa, Military, NATO, Syria
File Photo of Russian SU-24 Military Jet Harassing U.S. Navy Vessel in Black Sea, Adapted from U.S. Military Video

(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – March 1, 2016) The majority of Russians are not ready to restore relations with Turkey after it downed a Russian warplane in November 2015, a survey by the state-run VTsIOM pollster published Monday revealed. Some 63 percent of respondents think the Kremlin should not lift the anti-Turkish sanctions that were imposed by Moscow following the […]

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The Great Manipulator

Economy, Business, Investment, Trade, Europe, EU, Foreign Policy, Security, Visas, Middle East, North Africa, Military, NATO, Syria, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Kremlin and River

(RFE/RL – rferl.org – Brian Whitmore – February 24, 2016) Dmitry Medvedev recently played a telling little head game. When the Russian prime minister said at the Munich Security Conference that Moscow and the West had “slid into a new Cold War,” he essentially created a damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you-don’t situation. “If the West agrees that it is a new Cold War, then […]

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TRANSCRIPT: House Hearing on Understanding and Deterring Russia: U.S. Policies and Strategies – Oral remarks of Dr. Fiona Hill

Middle East, North Africa, Military, NATO, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections, Syria, Ukraine, Russo-Ukrainian War, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
U.S. Capitol in Bright Sunlight

House Armed Services Committee February 10, 2016 Hearing on Understanding and Deterring Russia: U.S. Policies and Strategies Oral remarks of Dr. Fiona Hill Fiona Hill is director of the Center on the United States and Europe and a senior fellow in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution. She is also co-author of the second edition of “Mr. Putin: […]

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NEWSWATCH: “Russian Aggression Drives Increase in European Defense Spending” – Defensenews.com

Europe, EU, JRL NewsBlog, Military, NATO, Ukraine, Russo-Ukrainian War
Europe Map

Fear of Russian aggression will help drive European defense spending up by 8.3 percent this year, putting a halt to 20 years of declining budgets … Over two decades after the end of the Cold War, Vladimir Putin’s expansionist policies in Crimea and Ukraine have pushed European leaders to once again increase their spending on military programs, according to the […]

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NEWSLINK: “The Russian Connection Between Syria and Ukraine. Moscow may try to link cooperation in the Syrian crisis to relief from sanctions.” – The National Interest/Joseph Nye

Europe, EU, Middle East, North Africa, Military, Newslinks, Syria, Ukraine, Russo-Ukrainian War, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
File Photo of Kremlin Tower, St. Basil's, Red Square at Night » Read more
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RBTH: NATO vs. Russia: Why all the recent talk of World War III?

Britain, UK, United Kingdom, Military, NATO, Russia & the West
File Photo of British Parliament Building, Big Ben, Thames, adapted from image at loc.gov

British military exercises that may have been carried out with potential deployment in eastern Ukraine in mind, recent comments by NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg and a BBC film depicting a Russia-NATO nuclear conflict following a pro-Russian uprising in Latvia are all doing their part to further stoke tensions between Moscow and the Atlantic Alliance, when a more measured approach is […]

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The rules of the new ‘Cold War’: Empty words and no retreat

Europe, EU, Foreign Policy, Security, Visas, Military, NATO, Russia & the West, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Mercator Projection Satellite Image of Earth

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev’s recent speech in Munich openly spoke of relations between Russia and the West in terms of a new “Cold War.” Dialogue between the two sides is now looking increasingly like a rhetorical war of attrition, with neither side on the offensive but neither willing to retreat either. (Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Georgy […]

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TRANSCRIPT: Dmitry Medvedev’s interview for Handelsblatt, Germany

Europe, EU, Foreign Policy, Security, Visas, Middle East, North Africa, Military, NATO, Syria, Ukraine, Russo-Ukrainian War
Dmitry Medvedev file photo

(Government.ru – February 11, 2016) Ahead of the Munich Security Conference, the Prime Minister answered questions from Editor-in-Chief Sven Afhüppe and international correspondent Mathias Bruggmann. Question: Mr Prime Minister, thank you for finding the time to meet with us. You will come to Munich to attend the Conference on Security. Handelsblatt will cover the proceedings and primarily your participation in […]

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TRANSCRIPT: Dmitry Medvedev’s interview with Time magazine

Baltics, Europe, EU, Foreign Policy, Security, Visas, Middle East, North Africa, Military, NATO, Nuclear, Missile Defense, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Dmitri Medvedev file photo

(Government.ru – February 15, 2016) Dmitry Medvedev has given an interview to Time magazine correspondent Simon Shuster following the Munich Security Conference. Question: Thank you very much for agreeing to this interview with Time magazine. I would also like to thank you for your remarks today at the conference. This was a very interesting and eloquent speech. You made a […]

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TRANSCRIPT: Dmitry Medvedev’s interview with Euronews TV channel

Assassinations, Beatings, Threats, Britain, UK, United Kingdom, Economy, Business, Investment, Trade, Europe, EU, Foreign Policy, Security, Visas, Middle East, North Africa, Military, NATO, Spies, Spy Allegations, Syria
Dmitry Medvedev file photo

(Government.ru – February 14, 2016) The Prime Minister spoke with Global Conversation presenter Isabelle Kumar on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference Question: Mr Prime Minister, thank you for joining the Global Conversation. The Syrian issue is a priority; it dominates the international agenda. It is now believed that we are approaching a turning point, although it remains to […]

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TRANSCRIPT: Dmitry Medvedev’s speech at the panel discussion – Munich Security Conference

Economy, Business, Investment, Trade, Foreign Policy, Security, Visas, Military, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Dmitri Medvedev file photo

(Government.ru – February 13, 2016) Dmitry Medvedev: Ladies and gentlemen, distinguished colleague Mr Valls, distinguished Mr Ischinger, my speech will be of a more general nature, but I hope it will be useful. The first cold war ended 25 years ago. This is not long in terms of history, but it is a considerable period for individual people and even […]

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TRANSCRIPT: Dmitry Medvedev’s interview for Handelsblatt, Germany

Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Dmitri Medvedev file photo

(Government.ru – February 11, 2016) Ahead of the Munich Security Conference, the Prime Minister answered questions from Editor-in-Chief Sven Afhüppe and international correspondent Mathias Bruggmann. Question: Mr Prime Minister, thank you for finding the time to meet with us. You will come to Munich to attend the Conference on Security. Handelsblatt will cover the proceedings and primarily your participation in […]

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RBTH: U.S. to spend $4.3 billion on ‘countering Russian aggression’

Europe, EU, Military, NATO, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
File Photo of White House with South Lawn and Fountain

The White House has announced that a special sum allocated to fighting Russian influence in Europe and the former Soviet space will be included in the country’s budget for the 2017 fiscal year. (Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – MARINA KARPOVA, RBTH – February 11, 2016) The U.S. fiscal year 2017 budget will include $4.3 billion allocated “for political, […]

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NEWSWATCH: “In Syria, Russia Protects Its Interests From Above and Below” – Stratfor

JRL NewsBlog, Military, Syria
Syria Map

Stratfor reports on the buildup of Russian air defenses in Syria in the aftermath of Turkey’s shoot-down of a Russian military aircraft. With such an extensive presence, Russia will be able to obstruct the war efforts of those opposed to Syrian President Bashar al Assad. The United States and its allies can still fly airstrikes against the Islamic State, but […]

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U.S. National Intelligence Director Says Russia Is Paranoid, Aggressive

Health, Epidemics, Substance Abuse, Military, NATO, Syria, Ukraine, Russo-Ukrainian War, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
DNI Seal and Smaller Seals of Agencies Related to DNI

(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Anna Dolgov – February 10, 2016) Russia is “paranoid” about NATO and is likely to continue “aggressive” actions this year to support its claim to great power status, U.S. National Intelligence Director James Clapper said in Senate testimony Tuesday. In a report on “Worldwide Threat Assessment” that Clapper presented to the Senate, Russia topped a […]

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How likely is an armed conflict between Russia and Turkey?

Middle East, North Africa, Military, NATO, Syria
Turkey and Environs Satellite Image

As relations between Russia and Turkey deteriorate, the question of a possible armed conflict between the two countries is being discussed more frequently. RBTH asked Russian and Turkish military experts to comment on how likely this outcome would be and asked them to lay out the possible scenarios. (Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – YEKATERINA CHULKOVSKAYA, RBTH – February […]

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