How Biden Can Punish Putin
If Trump won’t sanction Russia over its provocations in Afghanistan, his opponent should announce that if elected, he would.
A U.S. handover ceremony in Afghanistan.
Photographer: WAKIL KOHSAR/AFPAccording to a series of detailed dispatches from the New York Times, Russia’s military intelligence agency has offered bounties to Taliban fighters for killing U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan. Some details remain unclear, and the White House says that “the president was never briefed on this.”
Nonetheless: The undisputed facts are bad enough. If it’s true that President Donald Trump knew about the Russian scheme in February, it’s horrifying that as recently as last month he was lobbying allies to re-invite Russia into the Group of Seven industrialized nations. And if Trump didn’t read his intelligence, or his staff kept the news from him, it’s no better. Even if all the details are not yet verified, the political peril in which Trump now finds himself is well deserved.