Looking at the global chessboard, one can’t help but be puzzled. Only yesterday, Russia was dating Europe; today, the Kremlin is trying to persuade the world (and itself?) that it has fallen in love with Beijing. Witness Russia’s hosting last week of the dual summit of the BRICS and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization—a clear signal of Moscow’s own “pivot to Asia”, as well as its agenda to present the non-Western world as an alternative civilizational model to the West. The same experts, both Russian and Western, who recently viewed Russia as part of Greater Europe, today with the same gusto …read more
Source: Brookings