Sweden

What Will The Neighbors Think?

Posted on by Cheryl Rofer

As Russia threatens Ukraine and intervenes in Kazakhstan, its other neighbors are looking on. Russia’s words toward NATO have been accompanied by warnings to Sweden and Finland not to join NATO.

Russia is presented with a conundrum of its own making. It would like to have friendly or neutral neighbors, but, when they don’t toe that line, as particularly in the case of Ukraine, Russia argues it has no choice but to attack them. This does not encourage a friendly attitude in the neighbors.

Russia’s grab of Crimea and its attack on the Donbas alerted other neighbors to prepare for the worst, now amplified by the Russian military buildup around Ukraine and Russia’s demands on NATO and the United States. The neighbors must respond to Russia’s renewed demand for an explicit sphere of influence.

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Links – Thanksgiving 2017

Posted on by Cheryl Rofer

I know very little about Zimbabwe’s politics, but these sources seem reliable.  Zimbabwe’s clean slate: What brought Mugabe down, and why he didn’t see it coming.  Robert Mugabe’s Inner Circle Implodes. It’s good to see that this hasn’t exploded into a civil war, but it’s not over yet.

Negotiate with North Korea, chapter 3745. Long read on how North Korea may be tracking its missile tests. It’s important to get as much data as possible out of each test, but there need to be receiving stations for the data. Top photo from here. Read More

Links – January 7, 2017

Posted on by Cheryl Rofer

Donald Trump continues as a one-man DDOS attack on coherent thought. He has been tweeting at an elevated rate the past few days. I am trying to tune most of that out, but it does slow down my productivity. Since the guy is going to be President of the United States, it’s hard to ignore him. David Brooks captures the problem.

Here’s the intelligence community’s report on Russian interference in the US election.

Everyday authoritarianism is boring and tolerable. This post, from a scholar of comparative politics, is consistent with what I have been told by people who lived in the Soviet Union. It’s why we need to be extra vigilant about trends and actions by Donald Trump and his government. More from Daniel Nexon. Read More