Commentary / World May 18, 2016

May Day, Russia, Mayday!

Russian President Vladimir Putin used this year's holiday marking the Soviet victory in World War II to whip up jingoistic hysteria.

Commentary / World Apr 11, 2016

War returns to the Caucasus region

The frozen war between Armenia and Azerbaijan in the Nagorno-Karabakh region has thawed, with serious implications for the region.

Commentary / World Jan 6, 2016

Pacific dreaming in Moscow

Russia's government announces yet another set of impotent plans to develop its long-neglected Pacific region.

Commentary / World Nov 24, 2015

With friends like Vladimir Putin, who needs enemies?

Avenging the City of Light, Russia and the West can turn Syria into the desert of darkness, but from that darkness nothing good will come.

Commentary / World Nov 16, 2015

Russian Navy's red tide rising

Short of naval assets but wanting to flex its muscles at sea, Russia is employing a maritime version of the "hybrid warfare" it used to take control of Crimea.

Commentary / World Oct 21, 2015

Russian eagle takes steroids, reads Hegel, seeks recognition

The goal of Vladimir Putin's aggressive foreign policy may be a new contract with the West in which Russia is recognized as a leading power and treated as an equal.

Commentary | THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW Feb 19, 2006

On your own in the Ice Age

MOSCOW -- If scientists are bent on calling the overall weather mayhem of the past few years "global warming," more power to them, but this winter the term looked like a huge misnomer to the population of Eurasia -- from the Pacific to the ...

Commentary | THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW Jan 20, 2006

Even a child knows better

MOSCOW -- Occasionally, we all get wrong ideas about ourselves. A middle-aged person starts dressing like Leonardo di Caprio, a pizza deliveryman begins emulating "The Godfather," a school teacher turns herself into a Gestapo interrogator. Recently, Russian President Vladimir Putin decided he was Napoleon. Two ...

Commentary | THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW Jan 3, 2006

Putin 'exiles' the high court

MOSCOW -- Exiling someone is so very Russian. Although centuries passed by and regimes changed, authorities retained exile as a great tool of punishment and manipulation. Less objectionable than execution or imprisonment, it effectively uprooted and silenced the regimes' opponents -- and sometimes destroyed ...

Commentary | THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW Dec 15, 2005

Russian rightwingers ride benzene spill

MOSCOW -- The city of Khabarovsk is ill-starred. Founded by hopeful entrepreneurs as a major trade hub in the Russian Far East on the doorstep of China, it turned into a big dump -- a symbol of missed opportunities and disillusionment. For nearly 70 years, ...