I will soon be starting a new academic project: a history of the war between Russia and Ukraine. I am to have the book published by 2032 (10th anniversary of Russia's full-scale invasion).

https://t.co/HVsiAO5w9f. A powerful take by @ezraklein but he leaves an important question unanswered: shut down the government and *then what*?

A reasonable take by @khodorkovsky_en.

Wow this took off. I must be driving the sales of Merkel's memoir now. A general assessment: 3/5. Good for insomnia. A full review coming on my substack.

There are few people in the world who have a more nuanced and well-informed view on China-Russia ties (and with Mongolia in the mix!) than @DrRadchenko. We sat down to unpack recent Xi-Putin summit for @CEIP_Politika podcast. Tune in!

Merkel recounts her meetings with Xi.

Where I agree with @RadioFreeTom is where he argues that Trump's tweeting is embarrassing. Of course it is. But in the end, it's not what matters in this game.

The Chinese, the Russians, and the North Koreans know this more than anybody else.

Anyway, the whole "they are laughing" at us line is a curious display of insecurity. America is not respected for its leadership as much as for its economic power, technological prowess, and military capabilities. Which makes America a *very* serious nation.

As for Kim Jong-un, he clearly despises Xi. As for who he is pointing his missiles at, I wouldn't believe for a second they are all pointed at the U.S. There is no love lost between China and North Korea.

And it's not in Russia's interest to be China's junior partner, nor in Putin's interest to be Xi's sidekick. Putin is trying to correct the ship of the Russian state, but not at the price of giving up in Ukraine, which he thinks is a major legacy of his presidency.

The summit gave him much-needed leverage with Xi, and that's that. The idea that Putin has some great love for Xi is preposterous. Yes, they met 45 times, but these people do not have friends. They are goddamn dictators who only care about the interests of their regimes.

I don't think Putin's take on the summit with Trump is that it was a "humiliation" of the US president. You may have noticed how carefully he talked about the US since then (especially in China), refraining from criticizing Trump. That doesn't look like an effort to humiliate.

A well-argued piece, which I think misses the key point. Yes, there is a certain clownish element to the current administration: of that, I think, there is little doubt. But I wouldn't say the world hugely respect Biden. Laughed at him--yes. Respected? Are you kidding?

🎙️ NEW EPISODE of the Carnegie Politika podcast: @alexgabuev and @DrRadchenko discuss Sino-Russian relations in the past and present, and examine how strong the bond really is between the two.

This here with @DmytroKuleba is excellent: https://t.co/xJesO7by9M [in Ukrainian]. A nuanced analysis of where we are with the peace talks, and why there won't be any peace keepers in Ukraine (and why they are unnecessary).

Isn't this interesting? I am not making any arguments at this point, just a provisional observation. Thoughts?

And yet you are much more likely to hear people argue that the Soviet Union collapsed because Reagan conspired with the Saudis to bring down the price of oil (no evidence of this btw) than that Gorbachev bankrupted the USSR by launching the anti-alcohol campaign.

Here we have Gorbachev claiming that the loss was 37 billion rubles for the period 1985-88. But here's what's interesting. He places the losses from his anti-alcohol campaign for the same period at *49* billion rubles.

This is important because many (including myself) have argued that the decline in world oil prices was one of the key reasons for Soviet collapse. So I finally located some numbers--from the horse's mouth, so to speak.

You know what I love about economic history? It makes things more concrete. For example, in the context of a book I am writing now, I was really interested in understanding how much the Soviets lost from the oil price collapse in 1986 (in their own estimates).