Russia's President Vladimir Putin chairs a meeting of the Security Council. One European expert estimates that at least a third of Russia's diplomats work for Putin's intelligence agencies. Alexei Nikolskyi/RIA Novosti/Kremlin/Reuters
Claudia Rosett, The Hill: From the Baltics to the Middle East: Russia’s rising threat
It’s less than six years since President Obama mocked presidential contender Mitt Romney for warning about the resurgent threat from Russia. In one of the most memorable lines of the 2012 election, Obama scoffed that “the 1980s are now calling to ask for their foreign policy back because, you know, the Cold War’s been over for 20 years.”
Today, there’s plenty of evidence that the Cold War was already on its way back, with a vengeance. Russia’s President Vladimir Putin seized every opening presented by Obama’s policies of “reset,” “flexibility,” appeasement and retreat. During Obama’s second term, Russia made its military reentry via Syria into the conflicts of the Middle East, shored up its ties to Iran, and began reconfiguring the borders of Eastern Europe and the rules of the post-Soviet world order by snatching Crimea from Ukraine. In Washington, American politics has been embroiled since the 2016 election in investigations and bitter quarrels involving allegations of Russian dirty tricks.
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WNU Editor: Russian rhetoric aside .... the U.S. defense budget is exploding, and the Russian defense budget is either frozen or decreasing .... Russia to cut defense spending, capital construction outlays, vows presidential aide (TASS). So where is the threat? I guess the threat is geopolitical where concerns about Russia are primarily focused in eastern Europe, and among those who are not happy on the role that Russia is playing in the Middle East.