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Russia
made
headlines
for
all
the
wrong
reasons
this
week,
when
a
clutch
of
countries
led
by
the
U.S.
expelled
more
than
100
of
its
diplomats
and
intelligence
officers
over
suspicion
that
the
Kremlin
was
behind
a
nerve
agent
attack
on
a
Russian
spy
and
defector
to
the
U.K.,
Sergei
Skripal,
and
his
daughter
Yulia,
in
Salisbury
on
March
4.
Besides
the
U.S.,
14
member-states
of
the
European
Union,
including
Germany,
France,
Poland,
the
Czech
Republic,
Lithuania,
Italy,
Denmark,
the
Netherlands
and
Latvia,
undertook
coordinated
expulsions,
with
Australia
also
joining
them.
In
a
sense
this
move,
seen
as
the
most
dramatic,
concerted
such
purge
since
the
Cold
War
years,
has
been
coming
for
some
time.
Last
week
the
U.K.
led
the
way
when
it
expelled
23
Russian
diplomats,
but
the
week
before
that
the
U.S.
had
slapped
Russia
with
sanctions
against
multiple
individuals
and
entities
for
interfering
in
the
2016
U.S.
presidential
election
through
covert
online
propaganda,
including
fake
news.
Beyond
these
specific
charges
lie
other
alleged
violations:
in
Afghanistan,
President
Donald
Trump’s
senior-most
ground
commander
has
accused
Russia
of
arming
Taliban
militants;
on
the
North
Korean
crisis
Mr.
Trump
mentioned
in
January
that
Russia
was
helping
Pyongyang
avoid
UN
sanctions;
and
the
EU
last
year
voted
to
extend
into
2018
sanctions
that
prohibit
its
businesses
from
investing
in
Crimea.
Has
Russia
truly
gone
rogue,
and
is
this
its
grand
strategy
to
reclaim
its
superpower
status?
The
answer
is
yes
and
no.
To
an
extent
the
U.S.
response,
significant
though
it
may
appear
on
the
surface,
signals
to
Russia
an
inconsistent
application
of
any
principles
of
bilateral
and
multilateral
engagement.
Scarcely
a
week
ago,
Mr.
Trump
congratulated
Russian
President
Vladimir
Putin
on
his
re-election,
apparently
against
the
advice
of
senior
White
House
officials,
and
this
drew
sharp
criticism
even
from
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