Russian Foreign Policy Research and analysis regarding all aspects of Russia’s foreign policy. Russia’s foreign policy has in recent years become more assertive than it russian foreign policy 2013 been in the first two decades since independence. The Kremlin surprised many with its 2008 war in Georgia, its 2014 seizure of Crimea and intervention in eastern Ukraine, and its 2015 deployment of forces in the Syrian civil war. First name This field is required.

Last name This field is required. Experts review Russia’s strategic objectives and foreign policy with Europe, the Middle East, Asia, and the United States. Welcome to those of you, especially, who have come back after the other sessions. This is the third session of today’s Council on Foreign Relations Symposium on Russia and the West. I’m Andrew Nagorski, and I’ll be presiding. Like some of you in the audience and many of you who have talked today, I had various adventures in the old Soviet Union, the new Russia, and we’ll be talking about that today. And, in fact, I even remember in the mid-’90s there was this fleeting moment where some of us who were Moscow correspondents were worried that interest in Russia was really declining and we—no one will want to hear about it anymore.

So today’s panel, you have their bios. But, very briefly, on my far left Alina Polyakova from the Atlantic Council, James Nixey from Chatham House, and Jennifer Harris from the Council on Foreign Relations. Maybe I’ll start with a pretty broad question, but again, sort of harkening back to maybe my initial experience in the Soviet Union in the early ’80s when there was—you know, the Soviet Union was very expansive. Obviously, the Soviet empire was large.