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Western aid for civil-society development in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union needs to be evaluated from a past-present-future standpoint. It is also important to place the aid in the context of developments in the region.
Here, Russian scholar Alexander Pikayev gives us new insights into the collapse of the negotiated nuclear reduction process as experienced in Russia.
Last week, while many China experts inside and outside the Clinton administration were confidently predicting that China would not escalate the conflict with Taiwan, others warned that Beijing might well be contemplating an attack. This turned out to be correct.
Last week, the Chinese navy seized a Taiwanese freighter carrying provisions to Taiwanese soldiers stationed on the tiny Taiwanese island of Matsu a few miles off the coast of the Chinese mainland. The current Chinese military activities may not be mere gestures designed to intimidate Taiwan and the U.S. They may well be the opening phase of a serious military confrontation.
The official U.S. posture of prostration before Beijing -- the China hands call it "engagement" -- would be merely pitiful, perhaps even amusing, were it not so dangerous. But the Clinton administration is now applying its strategy of appeasement to the brewing crisis over Taiwan, and the result may be to hasten the military conflict the administration is trying to avoid.
Taiwan's President Li Teng-hui sent the American foreign policy establishment into a nervous frenzy last week when he declared that Taiwan would henceforth negotiate with China as one state to another. By carefully stripping away the absurd fictions of the "one-China" policy, President Li is actually doing all concerned a big favor.