In a three-hour refueling layover in Ukraine on Sunday US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson scored a little-noticed judo flip on that judo master, Russian President Vladimir Putin. Suddenly the big question is no longer last week’s worry in the…
Gunfight at the Ukraine Corral
2016 promises to be a decisive year for Ukraine. The sudden resignation on 3 February of Economics Minister Aivaras Abromavicius – and the immediate sharp fall of Ukraine’s sovereign bonds – suggest that the showdown is at hand, much sooner…
Will Ukraine Snatch Defeat from the Jaws of Victory?
Kiev has won an improbable victory by holding Russia’s military behemoth to a stalemate in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s undeclared war on Ukraine. After a year of intensive shelling during a poorly observed truce in the Donbas, the big guns…
Debunking an urban myth
It’s time to debunk the lingering urban myths that Germany has resisted imposing sanctions on Russia over its undeclared war on Ukraine and might once again desert the West in a flirtation with Russia. True, Chancellor Angela Merkel favors smart…
The Waiting Game
No, the West has not (yet) lost Ukraine in Vladimir Putin’s Russian roulette, and the fragile Minsk truce and Western sanctions on Moscow over its land grab in Ukraine have not failed. A more nuanced reading of the current state…
Russian Escalation in Donbas
Ever since Russia snatched the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine last March and ended Europe’s seven-decade ban on coercive border change, Moscow has possessed enough raw military might to occupy mainland Ukraine as well. Throughout 2014, however, for tactical reasons, the…
The Next Stage in the Ukraine Crisis
On Black Tuesday of this week soft economic power trumped hard military power for the first time since the Ukraine crisis began. The threatened meltdown of the Russian economy could put pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin to dial down…
Two Races Against Time
Kiev must implement painful reforms fast, Moscow weigh the cost of continued aggression Is there going to be a winter respite in Russia’s undeclared war on eastern Ukraine? If so, the newly elected government in Kiev must lose no…
And Now For “Hybrid Politics”
After parliamentary elections, another chance for Ukraine to rid itself from post-Soviet kleptocracy Now comes the hard part. Let’s call it “hybrid politics.” With Sunday’s election of a new parliament, Ukraine has its third chance in 23 years to rid…
Choosing Lesser Evils
Both Ukraine and Russia face unpleasant choices For six weeks the imperfect truce between Ukraine’s government and pro-Russian separatists in the southeast of the country has produced a relative lull in the Ukraine crisis. Open confrontation will resume after Ukraine’s…