REPLY TO THIS POSTLucas Inboden
WednesdayFeb 22 at 9:35pm
In “The Russia File” article, Robert Legvold lays out the President Obama’s administration’s engagement with Russia on multiple issues. He describes the President’s actions toward Russia while evaluating the areas of contention from both sides. The article covers four areas to evaluate titled “READY, SET, RESET,” “THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW,” “IN THE BEGINNING,” and “A FRESH START.” (Legvold, 2009) In the article the author cites areas where the two nations have a common interest such as limiting Nuclear Proliferation. (Legvold, 2009) He also shows a historical view of struggles that prohibited the two nations from maintaining “high level” relations due to conflicting views on multipolarity and unipolarity in the world. (Legvold, 2009)

The author uses many statements that show the differences between U.S. and Russia’s mindset going into any discussions. One statement made by the author says Russia should find “it in its national interest to deal with its neighbors by adopting a strategy of reassurances rather than a crude one of wielding carrots and sticks, particularly sticks” (Legvold, 2009). The author does not present the reader with information detailed enough to justify the remark. This is a theme throughout the paper where the author does not explain why previous accords or agreements did not produce the results he presents as achievable. The President Obama administration was a third presidency working on agreements with Russia as the author states in his article. He conveniently races past the failed agreement between Russia and President Clinton. The agreement was to stop North Atlantic Trade Organization (NATO) expansion towards Russia while removing weapons along its borders with states including Ukraine. (Blanton & Savranskaya, 2021) Reasons for the failure present the reader a better understanding on the topic then the demands from each side. The author should present that the U.S. under President Clinton broke the agreement with Russia expanding NATO while trying to gain the benefits from the agreement. (Blanton & Savranskaya, 2021) Understanding that one side had broken trust on a main point of contention between the two states, would help understand the hardship in America’s attempts to regain Russia’s cooperation on issues. The author indicates both the U.S. and Russia have a common goal to resist a nuclear capable Iran. (Legvold, 2009) This would be hard to conceive common goals as a great incentive to Russia when it has a historical record of the U.S. not honoring agreements. (Blanton & Savranskaya, 2021) Another issue the author claims Russia should be in favor of concerns the Afghanistan war. He claims that Russia knows it was in their best interest to have American engagement in Afghanistan. (Legvold, 2009) This was due to fear of Taliban rule or collapse at the Russian southern border. (Legvold, 2009) In this statement the author disregards Russia’s President Vladmir Putin’s own words given during the Munich Conference just two years prior. In his speech, the Russian President states he is against the U.S. actions in Afghanistan with military infrastructure. He goes further to exclaim that the actions of the U.S. are a threat to Russia regardless of their stated reasonings. (Putin, 2007) The words from the Russian President do not portray support for the West’s engagement against terrorist based on the close geographical relationship between Russia and Afghanistan.

REPLY TO THIS POST SEPRETLY!!!!!Estevan Hueso
ThursdayFeb 23 at 5:34am
In her article “Hanson: China is a greater threat than Russia” Madeline Peltzer does a great job of summarizing a lecture that she was able to attend in September 20, 2018 given by Victor Davis Hanson who is a scholar from the Hoover Institution. The date is important because as we work through this module at this current time we are blessed to be looking into this topic from the perspective of someone who is five years in the future from when the lecture an the article itself was published. Both Peltzer and Hanson lay the foundation of the article by stating that yes, Russia is a real threat to the United States, but this is really only the case in terms of military action against the United States, Russia is not on the same economic power house of a level as the United States(Porfiriev, 2020). Pelzer and Hanson state that the real threat to the United States of America is the Peoples Republic of China, this is manly due to two different factors. The first being the break neck speed in which the Peoples Republic of China’s economy has taken off and in just over forty short years the growth rate of the Chinese Economy has surpassed even that of the United States (Wu, 2004). The economic strength coupled with the current status of the Chinese Political Party led by Xi Jinping and his influence on the Peoples Republic of China’s goals of attaining more power and influence in the indo-pacific region of the world makes them a true threat of the United States to both Pelzer and Hanson’s point. One of the keys to China’s economic success is partly due to the United States of America turning a blind eye to the less than favorable methods that the Chinese’s have used to attain more technology and circumvent certain economic checks and balances that are imposed on most other countries. While it is most likely true that China does in fact pose a greater threat than Russia there is one thing that the author over looked when it comes to Russia and that is history, Russia is rattled with historical events related to war, this is a nation that is no stranger to conflict in the modern era, the same can not be said of China, this coupled with Russia vast arsenal of nuclear weapons (Sokov, 2020) and Vladmir Putin’s shaky mentality means that a major conflict with Russia is never off the table and current has more of a probability of turning into a conflict between Russia an the United States of America.