Section: Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars (USA)
Book Talk: Russia: Three Years After Crimea
The annexation of Crimea has transformed the Russian Federation. Three years of economic stagnation, international sanctions, and unstable oil prices have all had their effect. Within the government bureaucracy, power struggles are underway with new plans to address Russia’s post-Crimean reality. The editors of this book will analyze some...
Amid Public Dissent, Ukraine Issues Sanctions
On May 15, 2017, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko signed an order to impose new sanctions on Russia for the next three years. Ukraine will block Russian social media, TV channels, airlines, banks, and defense companies. The list specifies 1,228 individuals and 468 legal entities. …read more Source: Woodrow Wilson International Center...
Crimea As a Glimpse into a Post-American World
One explanation for Russia’s president Vladimir Putin’s momentous decision, three years ago, to go into Ukraine and annex Crimea is that he sensed an opening. (March 18, 2014, is the date officially considered the day of admission of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol to the Russian Federation.) …read more Source: Woodrow Wilson...
Against All Odds
Above: General Morozov inspecting troops of a tank unit at the Yavoriv Training Range in Western Ukraine, 1992 Kostiantyn Morozov and the Unlikely Establishment of Ukraine’s Military Researchers like to share archive war stories: traveling across the world to review foreign archives, cutting through red tape to obtain access, deciphering...
Russia and China: A Strange Case of Convergence
After every meeting between Chinese president Xi Jinping and Russian president Vladimir Putin, the two sides issue warm statements and stress their growing cooperation. Especially since the war in Ukraine began in 2014, Russia has tacked ever closer to China, shedding some of its traditional fear of its southern neighbor and seeking to compensate...
Matthew Rojansky on What the Trump Administration Should Focus on in First 100 Days
It’s brutal to have to follow Aaron, I don’t have a story. You know, I think I can answer the Ukraine question as well, which is very short. …read more Source: Woodrow Wilson International Center for...
The Year Putin Won
To receive an email when a new post becomes available, subscribe here. The year 2016 felt like the third year since 2014 rather than, say, the 25th since the collapse of the Soviet Union. When peering into Russia’s future from a Russian vantage point, one has to mark the year 2014 as a major threshold. It changed international politics and...
Preserving the Memory of Stalin’s Repressions, One Person at a Time
To receive an email when a new post becomes available, subscribe here. In Russia, as in much of the post-Soviet space, the past is the present. From Ukraine, to Belarus, to Poland and Lithuania, historical narratives of communism, World War II, the Holocaust, and the Holodomor—Ukraine’s Terror-Famine—are being reviewed, revised, and in many...
25 Years of Independence: The Ukrainian Referendum
On December 1, 1991, more than 92 percent of voters in Ukraine approved the Verkhovna Rada’s August Declaration of Independence. Mere days later, the Soviet Union dissolved and an independent Ukraine was born. The aftershocks of these events are still felt 25 years later, as questions of territory, sovereignty, and national identity remain...
Kennan Cable No.19: One Bed, Different Dreams
As China and Russia have grown closer in recent years, many describe their relationship as a marriage of convenience. Both nations have agreed to strengthen bilateral coordination on foreign policy. Chinese and Russian foreign ministers have recently reaffirmed their common positions on Syria, North Korea, Afghanistan, and the 5+1 agreement on...
