, Columnist
US Is Defeating Putin in the War of Coercion. That’s Dangerous.
Russia and NATO haven’t come into direct conflict, but only because so far both sides have wanted it that way.
What’s next?
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The US and Russia are waging the most intense contest in great-power coercion since the height of the Cold War. Russian President Vladimir Putin is using nuclear threats and other escalations in a bid to avoid humiliation in Ukraine. Washington is wielding its own array of pressures to force Putin to accept just that outcome.
The good news is that, so far, both strategies have been fairly carefully calibrated. The bad news is that America and Russia may still be on a collision course, because only one of these strategies can succeed.