“If we got along with Russia, that would be a good thing, not a bad thing,” he said. “And just about everybody agrees with that, except very stupid people.”
President Donald Trump will host a summit with heads of state from Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania at the White House on April 3.
NATO troops stationed near the Russian border have reported that Russian hackers are targeting their smartphones to “gain operational information, gauge troop strength, and intimidate soldiers,” the Wall Street Journal said in a report Wednesday.
Speaking at a security forum in Slovakia on Sunday, a member of the Russian parliament suggested his country’s military would resort to nuclear weapons to repel a U.S. or NATO incursion into Crimea or eastern Ukraine.
Fresh from his confirmation, Defense Secretary James Mattis declared the United States has an “unshakable commitment to NATO” as NATO was demonstrating its unshakable commitment to the Baltics by putting 1,200 troops in Lithuania.
Can President-elect Donald Trump run a charm offensive against Russia’s President Vladimir Putin and deliver a real reset that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton once promised with her bungled “reset button” stunt?
The Russian government is operating close to undersea cables, setting off alarms of American officials who believe the Kremlin could cut the lines if tensions continue to escalate.
Estonia announced plans to build a fence on their border with Russia for extra protection. In the past year, the former Soviet republic often voiced fears they might be Russia’s next target after the Kremlin targeted Ukraine.
The U.S. pledged $500,000 to the Baltics in order to combat Russian propaganda. The 12-month project will help train beginning and established Russian-language journalists.
A report surfacing after Russia’s celebration of the one-year annexation of Crimea claims Russian officials warned that any Western attempt to reclaim Crimea “would trigger a Russian response, possibly involving nuclear force.”
General Sir Adrian Bradshaw, NATO’s deputy commander of forces in Europe, told an audience at the Royal United Services Institute that Moscow’s ambitions on Ukraine are “an obvious existential threat to our whole being.”
