Americans see Putin as a serious threat. So do Trump’s top advisors. Does the President? (My latest column for The Jerusalem Post.)

February 7, 2017 By in Epicenter

jerusalempost-small

Here are excerpts from the column I wrote this week for The Jerusalem Post:

Americans have enough economic challenges at home and geopolitical challenges in the Middle East. They don’t want new troubles with Russia.

They will, therefore, likely give President Donald Trump some initial latitude in his attempts to build a healthier working relationship with Moscow, and hope Saturday’s phone call between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin is the start of something positive.

But make no mistake: Americans are extremely wary of the Russian leader. An exclusive new poll finds that most Americans see Putin as a nuclear-armed “czar” who poses a threat to the security of the US and her closest allies, including Israel, and urgently want him contained by a reinvigorated Western alliance….
[To read the full column — including the results of an exclusive national poll I commissioned via McLaughlin & Associates — please click here]
…..Such concerns are certainly justified.

In November, Putin moved 55,000 troops to the border of Ukraine, raising fresh concerns Russia might be tempted to seize the rest of the former Soviet republic.

Putin is also making threatening moves toward the Baltic nations of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Each of these former Soviet republics is now a full NATO member. Under Article Five of the NATO accord, a Russian attack against one would be considered an attack against all of NATO, requiring a response that could suddenly put the US and Western Europe in a hot war with Russia….

….The big question now is this: what manner of leadership will the Trump administration provide after eight disastrous years of the Obama administration, including its famously failed Russian “reset”?

—————

———————-—-

%d bloggers like this: