Negotiation involving compromises on both sides will spare the people suffering, while preserving their sovereignty and independence. “Forget the cheese – let’s get out of the trap” — Robert A. Lovett, U.S. Secretary of Defense 1951-53. The talks now underway in Belarus between Ukraine and Russia provide the possibility of a peace agreement and an...Read More

In response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the West now has no choice but to impose the toughest possible economic sanctions on Russia and to seek to unite as much of the world as possible in pressing Russia to end the attack. All scholars and analysts of Russia and the countries of the former...Read More

The Western attempt to expel Russia from Europe has failed. That there was such an attempt was always implicit in the strategy of seeking to admit every European country but Russia into NATO and the European Union. In this context, the NATO slogan “A Europe Whole and Free” is an explicit statement that Russia is...Read More

The new threat of war over Ukraine resulting from the Russian demands of December 2021 should focus the minds of U.S. and European policymakers on the unsolved dispute that is responsible for much of the tension between Russia and Ukraine, and that provides the most likely flashpoint for war. The Donbas conflict, which has cost...Read More

The Biden administration has created a completely unnecessary confrontation with Russia at a time when reasonable working relations with Moscow are extremely important for achieving two immediate and key administration goals: rejoining the nuclear agreement with Iran, and a peace settlement in Afghanistan facilitating U.S. military withdrawal from that country and an end to America’s...Read More

GPI Senior Fellow, Professor Anatol Lieven, has been invited to join Ambassador Jack Matlock, David Speedie, Katrina vanden Heuvel and other eminent experts and practicioners on US-Russia relations on the Board of the American Committee for US-Russia Accord (ACURA), formerly the Committee for East-West Accord. Here is a conversation between James Carden and Professor Lieven...Read More

Beijing’s ambitions shouldn’t be treated as an existential threat to the United States. A central distinction in realist international relations thought is that between vital and secondary national interests. Vital interests are threats to a state’s survival, and can take the form either of conquest and subjugation from outside, or the promotion of internal subversion...Read More

After the long stand-off against communism, victory seemed as total as it was sudden. But the west has since fractured and is now losing prestige and influence—does the reversal expose a moral defeat? As the US prepares to plunge into a new cold war with China in which its chances do not look good, it’s...Read More

In recent years, the internal challenges to Western liberal democracy and the early effects of climate change have both intensified drastically. In early 2020, the impact of the coronavirus outbreak added a harsh reminder of the capacity of epidemic diseases not only to kill human beings but to cause massive economic, social and political disruption....Read More

Jared Diamond’s Upheaval shows how in times of catastrophe nation states—just like individuals—need to rely on their ego-strength to survive. “How nations cope with crisis and change” is rather a big subject, which suggests something on the scale of Arnold Toynbee’s A Study of History. In Upheaval, Jared Diamond, the great analyst of historical ecological collapses, has...Read More