Thank you @NATO! #NATOLondonpic.twitter.com/8gJeXZxwpHMeanwhile, both Trump's domestic critics and the hostile mainstream press were busy hyping the president's early departure as a sign he is mentally unstable, a thin-skinned "snowflake," and "privately viewed with a mixture of mirth and alarm" (The Guardian).
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 4, 2019
: "When one great power threatens to displace another, war is almost always the result — but it doesn't have to be"(with a clear emphasis on the first part of the subtitle). Martyanov correctly calls this (typically "political science geeks") cliché as very dangerous and misleading. He then proceeds to debunk a who's who list of US political science cliches, including the latest one, the so-called "hybrid warfare". He speaks of "unnecessary and pseudo-scholastic confusion" and he adds that the current "Western think-tankdom" is "utterly unprepared" for the realities of modern warfare. As somebody who worked (during my college years) for several US think tanks in Washington DC, I can only agree. I also know for a fact that most think tanks will write anything, no matter how false, just to secure more funding (I even had colleague who worked in "respectable" think tanks laugh about the nonsense they were writing just to get more funding).
"Russia is ready to immediately, as soon as possible, before the end of the year, extend the New START treaty without any preconditions, so that there would be no double, triple interpretation of our position later. I'm saying this officially."The New START treaty, which obliges Moscow and Washington to reduce the number of its strategic nuclear missile launchers by half, was signed in April 2010. The agreement expires in February 2021, but there's an option for it to be extended until 2026.
NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg confirmed in a press conference that the Western military bloc is "in favor of dialogue" with Russia — yet, this apparent openness still didn't extend to taking any questions from Russian reporters.
During the Wednesday press gathering, an AFP reporter asked Stoltenberg how he felt about French President Emmanuel Macron's call for cooperation with Russia. Stoltenberg said he agreed with the statement from Paris and that the NATO bloc as a whole was in favor of keeping the lines of communication with Moscow open.
Stoltenberg added that dialogue was necessary because Russia is NATO's "closest" and "biggest" neighbor and it's important to "strive for a better relationship." He then went on to take questions from journalists representing Sky News, the BBC, the Washington Post and North Macedonia's Telma TV, among others.
Yet, when the opportunity arose for the NATO secretary general to take a question from a Russian journalist, time was up — and the decision was final. What happened to those lines of communication?
Having sat patiently through the press conference and not been called upon, one Russian reporter piped up as the event concluded to ask if Stoltenberg would permit "one question from Russia, please!"
Stoltenberg lingered at the podium for a couple of seconds, looking toward an aide who quickly jumped in to save him: "We said this was the last question, so I'm afraid time is pressing. Thank you," she said before swiftly ushering him off stage.
Comment: Presumptuous of McKenzie to flat out point the finger at Iran for the Saudi oil attacks, when the most likely culprit is Yemen. After all, they've done it before, but still no one believes it. The circumstances are murky, and no determinations have been made yet.