Publications

With NATO’s latest gathering this week in Vilnius, Washington is understandably focused on what the United States and its allies should do next to help Ukraine rebuff Russia. Moscow’s invasion, however, is part of a larger, multi-nation challenge to which Washington has not yet developed a comprehensive response.

That challenge is the axis of deepening diplomatic, military, and economic cooperation between China, Russia, and Iran. Washington is responding to individual provocations in ways that seem to contradict one another.

With Washington resuming indirect talks with Tehran over its nuclear program, opponents of the 2015 nuclear deal in the United States and abroad are raising legitimate fears that Washington will provide the Islamic Republic with sanctions relief while getting little, if anything, in return. And who can blame them?

To be sure, our leaders must engage not just with democratic allies but with autocrats in Beijing, Moscow, Tehran, and elsewhere. Presidents are wise to seek meetings in which to enunciate our values, delineate our priorities, glean what we can from our adversaries, and seek cooperation when possible.

Engaged in high-stakes political drama, Washington’s playmakers can forget that the world watches their every move—with our allies looking for leadership and growing concerned that we may no longer have the wherewithal to provide it, and our adversaries savoring our domestic turmoil.