| | | | Fareed: The Trump Effect – Allies Embarrassed, Foes Gloating | | The erratic nature of President Donald Trump's foreign policy grabs headlines, Fareed suggests in his latest Washington Post column. "The outlandish positions, the many flip-flops, the mistakes."
"But far more damaging in the long run might be what some have termed the Trump effect: his impact on the domestic politics of other countries. That effect appears to be powerful, negative and enduring. It could undermine decades of U.S. foreign policy successes," Fareed writes.
"In foreign policy, great statesmen always keep in mind one crucial reality: Every country has its own domestic politics. Crude rhetoric, outlandish demands, poorly thought-through policies and cheap shots all place foreign leaders in a box. They can't be perceived as surrendering to the United States, and certainly not to a nation led by someone who is determined to show that for the United States to win, others must lose. That's one big difference, among many, between doing a real estate deal and managing foreign policy."
| | Le Pen: Not Really So Far Right? | | Critics have been happy to label Marine Le Pen a far-right candidate. But overuse of the term "has eroded the boundaries it created, making many people suspicious of all such designations," writes Douglas Murray for The Spectator.
"Many people -- especially young people -- are less suspicious of the National Front than they perhaps ought to be because they have seen people who do not deserve the label 'far-right' being branded in precisely such a way," Murray argues.
"[I]n each country on the continent I have traveled around, over-liberal usage of the appellation is grinding down the political gearbox. Not just because it is so often used to advance a particular cause…but also because once a 'far-right' tag is in the air, the brakes come off all political argument." - From Russia to France with love. Marine Le Pen's supporters in the National Front and Moscow "say that her ties to Russia and the support she enjoys there reflect a natural affinity with the Kremlin rather than any systematic or organized covert subversion campaign," write Max Seddon and Michael Stothard in the Financial Times.
Still, "over the past several years, [Vladimir Putin] and the far-right politician, who share a similar nationalist outlook, have developed close ties. These links have been cemented by complex financial arrangements and overwhelmingly positive coverage of Ms Le Pen in the Russian state-backed media."
| | Trump Makes Nice With Saudis | | | Despite his record of bashing Saudi Arabia, President Trump will likely get a warm reception from King Salman bin Abdul Aziz al-Saud when he makes the Kingdom his first overseas destination as president, Michael Crowley writes for Politico.
"The Saudi leader considered Obama an unreliable ally and distrusted Obama's diplomacy with Sunni Saudi Arabia's mortal Shiite enemy, Iran," Crowley says.
"But Saudi officials have given Trump a pass on the strident rhetoric, which they consider less important than his hard line on radicalism and his disinterest in pressing human rights and political reform." | | Russia's "Unprecedented" Weapon in Syria | | Russian President Vladimir Putin has "deployed an unprecedented Russian weapon to Syria," writes Neil Hauer in Foreign Policy: "Several units of Chechen and Ingush commandos hailing from Russia's restive North Caucasus region."
Hauer writes that aside from combat skills, the brigades are valuable to a country that has been extremely sensitive to casualties in Syria and a government that "has gone to extreme lengths to hide its losses."
"Casualties are often only publicly confirmed after observers find the tombstones of deceased soldiers in their hometown cemeteries. Moscow's official figures only account for 30 dead in Syria -- with the true figure likely much higher. Using nonethnic Russian special personnel might protect the Kremlin from a public backlash sparked by rising battlefield casualties."
| | The Wildcard in German Race? | | | German Chancellor Angela Merkel's chances in September's election hinge "on there not being a repeat" of the refugee crisis that hit Europe in 2015, Spiegel Online reports. But a significant uptick along a key migrant stream so far this year could complicate her reelection bid. "Berlin is particularly concerned because it's not just Africans who are taking the Mediterranean route to Italy. An increasing number of South Asians are as well, which could mean that the route across the sea to Italy is now seen as a viable alternative to the defunct Balkan route. People from Bangladesh now represent the second largest group of migrants that have crossed over from Libya this year." | | Do you have an ear for Bach and Goethe? Are you willing to shake hands? Are you proud of Europe? If you answered yes to these and similar questions, then you meet some of the guidelines proposed by Germany's interior minister for what it means to be German, writes Kate Connolly in The Guardian.
Thomas de Maizière "has reignited a debate about the need to foster a Leitkultur -- a dominant culture -- which first surfaced in the 1990s and looks set to be one of the leading issues in the campaign for Germany's general election in September," Connolly writes.
"De Maizière, a Christian Democrat politician, used a guest column in the tabloid Bild am Sonntag to pose the question 'who are we and who do we want to be?' He referred to Leitkultur as a vital 'yardstick for the coexistence' of Germans and immigrants." | | | | | | |
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