US Policy

US’ Bill on Info War Against Russia Has Soros’ Fingerprints All Over It
The US bipartisan initiative to launch information warfare against Russia has George Soros's fingerprints all over it, Pamela Geller, US journalist and President of the American Freedom Defense Initiative told Radio Sputnik. According to Geller, Soros wants to prevent a rapprochement between Russia and the US. [...]
Save
US Senators Introduce Bill Requiring Approval for Lifting Anti-Russia Sanctions
A bipartisan group of US senators led by Republican Lindsey Graham and Democrat Ben Cardin introduced a legislation granting Congress a veto right over any decision by President Donald Trump’s administration to lift anti-Russian sanctions. [...]
Save
‘All on me’: Homeland Security chief falls on sword over chaotic travel ban rollout
Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly took the blame for the poor rollout of President Donald Trump’s executive order banning nationals from seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the US, but said there was a need for speed in doing so. [...]
Save
What Trump’s ‘Great Wall’ Misses
President Trump’s “Great Wall” ignores a key reason why desperate Mexicans and Central Americans flee north – the history of U.S. military and economic intervention that has created poverty and repression, notes William Blum. Instead of building a “Great Wall” on the Mexican border, President Trump might find it so much cheaper, so much easier, so much more humane, so much more popu [...]
Save
Trump’s Attacks on Iran, China, Taiwan Potentially Harmful for Ties With Russia
While 2016 showed some promise that global politics in 2017 can improve, much will depend on the first steps of the US' new administration, according to the Head of the Russian Parliamentary Foreign Affairs Committee Konstantin Kosachev, who spoke to RIA Novosti about two possible models of global development in 2017. [...]
Save
US tanks, infantry fighting vehicles arrive in Estonia amid NATO buildup on Russian borders
US military hardware, including M1A2 Abrams battle tanks and Bradley infantry fighting vehicles, have arrived in the northern Estonian town of Tapa as part of continued US efforts to counter the alleged Russian threat.   [...]
Save
Empire Files: US-Russia Relations in “Most Dangerous Moment”
Leading scholar on US-Russia relations addresses the claim being trumpeted by politicians and media on both sides of the political spectrum that Russia is now the "number one" threat to the United States. Given the proxy wars in Syria and Ukraine, Dr. Cohen tells host Abby Martin that the real alarming danger today is "a new, multi-front Cuban missile crisis." Dr. Stephen Cohen is Professor Eme [...]
Save
Steering Trump Back to Endless War
President Trump’s chaotic first two weeks have seen senior aides reverse his most promising plans for restoring realism to U.S. foreign policy, especially regarding Russia and the Mideast, reports Daniel Lazare. Well, that didn’t take long, did it? The Trump administration hadn’t even reached its two-week mark when it surrendered a major portion of its independence and fell in behind the [...]
Save
Russian, US Analysts Urge Trump Not to Make an Iraq-Like Mistake with Iran
On Sunday, the Wall Street Journal reported that the Trump administration was looking to 'drive a wedge' between Russia and Iran in its effort to improve relations with Moscow while confronting Tehran. Multiple observers, from Russian foreign policy analysts to American paleo-conservatives, warn that a US-Iran clash would be a catastrophic mistake. [...]
Save
Russia disagrees with Trump labeling Iran ‘number one terrorist state’
Russia disagrees with a remark recently made by US President Donald Trump’s that branded Iran as “the number one terrorist state,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, citing partnership between Moscow and Tehran. “We do not agree with the definition,” Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Monday. [...]
Save
Trump: US supports NATO, but wants all members to pay fair share
Donald Trump has stated that although the US strongly supports NATO, it wants all members to make their full contributions to the alliance. His comments were made during a speech at the US Central Command in Florida. [...]
Save
Unspeakable: the Black Book of Imperial Terrorism
American “mainstream” journalists who want to keep their paychecks flowing and their status afloat know they must report current events in a way that respects the taboo status of the nation’s underlying inequality and oppression structures and its savage and relentless imperial criminality. Those topics are understood as off limits, as beyond the narrow parameters of acceptable and polite di [...]
Save
The Double Standard on Yemen’s Suffering
The Trump administration condemns Iran as somehow responsible for a Yemeni rebel group’s attack on a Saudi warship, but ignores the Saudi-inflicted bloodbath on the Yemeni people, as Gareth Porter explained to The long-running U.S.-backed Saudi war against a Yemeni rebel group has led to mass hunger and civilian slaughter — suffering comparable to the humanitarian crisis of Aleppo in Syria [...]
Save
Trump Bends to Neocon Pressures
President Trump’s calls for reorienting American foreign policy look to be disintegrating in his first two weeks in office as he embraces the neoconservative hostilities toward Iran and Russia, as Andrew The Trump Administration’s goal of de-escalating tensions with Russia is meeting stiff resistance in Eastern Europe where many reject the notion that a diplomatic solution can be reached ov [...]
Save
Trump Schooled on Separation of Powers
President Trump is getting a crash course on the U.S. Constitution’s separation of powers as federal courts knock down his temporary immigration ban aimed at seven mostly Muslim countries, reports Marjorie Cohn. On Jan. 27, President Trump made good on his campaign promise to institute a ban on Muslims entering the U.S. Trump’s executive order (“EO”) is titled “Protecting the Nation F [...]
Save
Trump ‘Likely to Team Up With Russia, Damascus to Liberate Raqqa From Daesh’
The only way for US President Donald Trump to liberate Raqqa, the de facto capital of Daesh (ISIS/ISIL), from terrorists, is to join forces with Russia and Damascus on the ground, Russian military expert Ivan Konovalov told Radio Sputnik. [...]
Save
Netanyahu Sees Trump Presidency as a Chance to Do Whatever He Wants in Palestine
Speaking to Sputnik, Neve Gordon, visiting Professor of Politics at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London, said that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sees Donald Trump's presidency as carte blanche for Tel Aviv to act in the occupied territories. [...]
Save
Against All Odds: What’s Behind Washington’s Softening Stance Toward China
Both Beijing and Washington are by no means interested in unleashing an all-out trade war, experts believe. Beijing and Washington are exchanging signals and testing waters before starting a serious dialogue about the future of bilateral relations, Russian expert Nikita Maslennikov told Sputnik. [...]
Save
Trump slams court ruling as “ridiculous,” US suspends travel ban
The Department of Homeland Security has said it will stop flagging travelers from the countries under the Trump administration’s travel ban, following a federal judge’s ruling to suspend the executive order. A spokesperson for Homeland Security said in a statement on Saturday that the decision was made in order to comply with a Friday ruling by a federal judge, adding that the department wi [...]
Save
‘Maniac orders:’ Senior Russian MP blasts US program to estimate nuclear attack outcome
The deputy speaker of the Russian State Duma says the US Congress is “transfixed on war and destruction,” after it issued an order to evaluate the ‘survivability’ of Russian and Chinese leaders in the event of a nuclear exchange. [...]
Save
‘NATO exercises on Russia border part of US buildup of empire ‘
This is also the first time US troops will have been stationed right on Russia’s borders. It is a great concern and is part of the US buildup of empire, says Elsa Rassbach, German affiliate of War Resisters International, Code Pink. NATO's anti-Russia exercises are being ratcheted up with Germany announcing it would deploy tanks to Lithuania. [...]
Save
‘US-patrolled safe zones in Syria would amount to an act of war’
If President Trump is talking about safe zones in Syria and the surrounding region, does he not know that there are already safe areas and camps run by the UNHCR in Turkey, Jordan, Lebanon, says foreign affairs commentator, Jonathan Steele. [...]
Save