Russia

It’s no secret that relations between Moscow and the West have deteriorated the post-Cold War lows. 

The annexation of Crimea and the conflict in Ukraine have pushed the two sides to the brink of a Baltic battle while Russia’s intervention in Syria changed the West’s calculus when it comes to pushing for regime change in the Mid-East. 

Earlier this year, in a hilariously accurate assessment of US foreign policy, Vladimir Putin’s Security Council issued a statement entitled "About The US National Security Strategy". Here are some notable excerpts (translated):

President Putin has signed a decree approving of a new national security strategy to deal with the ever-increasing threat NATO pose to Russia.  The National Security Strategy of the Russian Federation says that it is concerned with the build up of NATO’s military.

Russia and China have agreed to join forces militarily in the fight against ISIS and terrorism, as the Chinese National People’s Congress passed the “On Combating Terrorism” law on December 27.  The Russian Foreign Ministry have announced, “We proceed from the fact that the Chinese partners have taken an important step towards the creation of a solid legal framework to effectively combat terrorism in all its forms and manifestations“.

Submitted by Burak Bekdil via The Gatestone Institute,

• Earlier in 2015, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that he found it difficult to understand what Russia was doing in Syria, since "it does not even border Syria."

• By that logic, Turkey should not be "doing anything" in the Palestinian territories, Somalia, Egypt, Pakistan, Afghanistan or any of the non-bordering lands into which its neo-Ottoman impulses have pushed it.

On Tuesday, we took a close look at the forecast for the Russian economy given various assumptions about the price of oil in 2016. 

While Russia has thus far managed to weather the crude storm relatively well (indeed, Moscow is now pumping more crude than ever before and expects oil exports to rise for the first time in six years in 2015), the numbers do not lie.