"What European Union membership would mean for war-torn Ukraine" PBS NewsHour 6/17/2022
Excerpt
SUMMARY: The European Union's executive arm on Friday recommended putting Ukraine on a path to membership. This comes as the U.S. and Europe pledged earlier this week to support Ukraine militarily. Jeremy Shapiro, research director of the European Council on Foreign Relations who was on the State Department's policy planning staff during the Obama administration, joins John Yang to discuss.
"Brooks and Capehart on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Biden’s Supreme Court nomination" PBS NewsHour 2/25/2022
Excerpt
SUMMARY: New York Times columnist David Brooks and Washington Post columnist Jonathan Capehart join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week in politics, including Russia's invasion of Ukraine and President Biden’s selection for the U.S. Supreme Court.
Judy Woodruff (NewsHour): With the world's eyes on Ukraine, and President Biden moving forward on his pick for the U.S. Supreme Court, we turn to the analysis of Brooks and Capehart.
That's New York Times columnist David Brooks and Jonathan Capehart, columnist for The Washington Post.
Very good to see both of you. Thank you for being here on this Friday night.
We're going to talk about Ukraine in just a minute.
But, David, I want to start with President Biden's choice of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson for the court. What did you make of his choice of her?
David Brooks, New York Times: She seems great.
What you want on the court is someone with a lot of intellectual firepower, but without intellectual arrogance. And she seems to have that. As Marcia and others mentioned before, she has the defender. She was a regular old judge on — with real trials, not just a fancy appellate judge.
So, she has been in the trenches. She seems like just a wonderful person.
I read a very good story in The 19th about four friends — or three friends she had starting at freshman year in Harvard. These were four Black women who entered Harvard together. They roomed together. They were sisters together. All four of them went to Harvard Law together. And, since then, they have been in each other's weddings, they have been at each other's childbirths.
And what they describe, her three friends describe about her, is someone who's the social organizer, someone who early on said, I'm going to take up a lot of space. I'm going to make my point of view known.
And I think one of them early in college said, you know, you're going to be on the Supreme Court one day.
So, if she could see it that early, maybe she's fit to be there.
Judy Woodruff: Jonathan, what's your take on her?
Jonathan Capehart, Washington Post: Well, she's definitely fit to be there.
I didn't read the story you read David, in The 19th. I read this big profile of her online in The Washington Post. And what came — the four women were also featured in that profile. But what I got from that was a woman and a lawyer and now a judge who is and has been pragmatic on the bench. Sure, she follows the law and she's grounded in her belief in the law and belief that the law should be meted out equally.
And throughout her career at Harvard, both undergrad and law school, when she — there were moments when other Black students were looking to protest X, Y, or Z, sometimes, she participated. Other times, she didn't. And the reason why she didn't was because she thought it was more important that she be in class and prove folks wrong.
And I'm thinking about a situation where, at Harvard, someone in her dorm unfurled a Confederate Battle Flag out the window. And, initially, she did protest, but she told her friends, look, one of the things they want us to do is to not focus on our classes. And if we don't focus on our classes, we flunk out, thereby proving to them, at least, that we don't belong here.
So, I think what President Biden has done was nominate someone who is coming to the bench, as David said, with intellectual firepower, but also someone who's going to be somebody who tries to bring the liberal and the overwhelming conservative majority together on some of the key issues that are coming up before the court even after she's confirmed.
Judy Woodruff: And, David, how do you see her potential effect on the court?
We're starting to hear some Republicans raise objections, questions about her. Mitch McConnell is one of them. But what do you think lies ahead, if she's confirmed?
David Brooks: Well, she's — there are nine personalities on the court. And so each personality adds something to the little family drama there, they have there.
My impression of the court has always been, they find ways to get along. And — but bringing in a new personality will widen the perspective of the court, will bring a new set of perspectives, a new lived set of experiences. It can't help but have a humanizing aspect.
Ideologically, there are all these rating systems that rate judges on how liberal or how conservative they are. She's pretty much in the mainstream of Democratic nominees. One of the rating systems I saw put her slightly to the right of Elena Kagan. Another put her a bit to the left. But she's very much in the mainstream of a Democratic nominee.
And she's obviously replacing a Democratic nominee, so, as Marcia Clark said earlier today, that it's probably not going to alter the ideological balance, but it'll widen the human aperture.
Judy Woodruff: And, Jonathan, how do you see her fitting in? And how do you read the coming Republican opposition?
Jonathan Capehart: Well, I think she will fit in just fine, considering she's been on the bench for a few years now, and folks love her.
When it comes to the Republican opposition, the idea — I can't remember which Republican member of Congress said this — that she's some left-wing radical, it's just sort of — that would have been branded on to any — whoever the President named. It just now happens to be Judge Jackson.
I think that, if Republicans stick to substantive criticisms of Judge Jackson, either her record or rulings or cases, they will be fine.
But the moment they stray into the territory that Senator Kennedy of Louisiana did by saying he hoped the President would choose someone who could tell the difference between a J. Crew Catalog and a law book; or another member of Congress who said before even a person was named that, no matter what, that the President was making an affirmative action hire, if they go down that route, they should be prepared for withering criticism.
And, also, Republican leaders, those who say that they're Republican leaders, should be prepared to condemn those folks, because there is no question that Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson is qualified to be on the court, should be on the court, and is not some radical, but, as David said, is in the mainstream of American political thought and life.
Judy Woodruff: So, now we turn to the thing that we have all been, I guess, fixated on for the last several days.
The last time I talked to the two of you, last Friday, the Russians hadn't begun their attack, their assault on Ukraine.
But, David, now they have. This, I think, is the first time in modern memory that we have been able to watch a war unfold, one country attacking another in real time on television and social media and the rest of it.
But what do you make of what Russia has done and is doing so far?
David Brooks: Well, I'm just impressed by the Ukrainian people. I'm impressed by the Russian people who are on the streets protesting.
But the Ukrainian people are facing very long odds. And they seem to be facing them with resolve and sometimes heroic self-sacrifice. And I'm just — my hat is off, and my eyes of admiration are for them.
I think we're entering another era. We were blessed to live for many years, probably all of our lives so far, in this era of rules. We may be ending that era and reentering an era of great power rivalries, such as we saw in the 17th century and the 18th century and the 16th century and the 15th century.
And it's just not pleasant to live in those eras, because nobody is secure. Vladimir Putin only thrives in areas where nobody is secure. And so we may be, with Russia, with China, defending Taiwan, we may be one great power forever after, or least for a long time after, engaged in constant struggles to head off authoritarian tyranny.
And that will involve different defense budgets. It will involve electing different sorts of people to be our leaders. It will involve a much more bloody and much less pleasant way to live in a set of mutual democracies.
Judy Woodruff: It's hard to watch, isn't it, Jonathan?
Jonathan Capehart: It is, again, the first major land war on the European continent in more than 70 years.
As David said, this is now — this is a battle of ideas. But, as Hillary Clinton and Dan Schwerin write in "The Atlantic" today, this is — what's happening now in Ukraine is much bigger than that. They write: "Ukraine is one flash point in a larger global struggle between democracy and autocracy."
And they point out that the day that Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin met in Beijing, which was February 4, on Friday, was the same day that the Republicans said that the January 6 insurrection was — quote — "legitimate political discourse."
The battle between autocracy and democracy is — has — was a factor in President Biden's presidential campaign, but there on the streets in Ukraine, in the air, where — in terms of the war that Russia is waging on Ukraine, we are seeing right there the battle between democracy and autocracy.
And the fact that the United States and President Biden is leading the alliance to, at a minimum, defend the NATO alliance, but also help the Ukrainian people, shows that everyone takes this seriously.
There was a lot of talk about whether the NATO alliance was going to wither on the vine, whether it could be — could hold together. And in the face of this war, before the impending war with Vladimir Putin, they have rallied, and they're stronger. But that battle between democracy and autocracy and having democracy win is not assured, especially because democracy here in the United States is the weakest it's been in memory.
Judy Woodruff: David, a lot of people watching President Biden very closely because of what happened in Afghanistan.
But what's your assessment of how he has managed this, handled this so far?
David Brooks: I think quite well.
He's organized the alliance. For once, we won the information war. He really leaked all the intelligence. And it was all vindicated. Our intelligence community was excellent in predicting what the Russians were going to do. And they went ahead and did it. So he did that part well.
He is playing with an extremely weak hand. Putin is willing to commit troops. We, wisely, are not — unwilling to commit troops. That's one disadvantage.
Second, we're unwilling and our European allies are unwilling to impose sanctions that would impose any costs on Putin. To do this right, we have to go after the Russian economy, which is essentially going after the energy sector. We're not going to do that because European and American economies don't want to impose any costs on themselves.
So, I think the sanctions are weak. I think the alliance between Russia and China, which seems to be reasonably strong, is extremely troubling.
The hope I have, and I think the place to focus our efforts and our attention, is on the Ukrainian resistance. If the Ukrainian resistance, with the help of the west, can make the occupation of Ukraine very costly, then this whole thing does backfire on Putin.
But I would focus on that, rather than, say, the sanctions, which have been symbolic and not nothing, but clearly not strong enough to impose any real costs on the Russians.
Judy Woodruff: Jonathan, how do you size up the reaction here and in Europe?
Jonathan Capehart: Well, I would say that, late this afternoon, the United States, United Kingdom and the European Union announced sanctions on Putin and his foreign minister, Lavrov, personally. So that is a ratcheting up of the pressure on Putin, on Russia.
This is the — I think the third — second round of sanctions. And there are plenty more things that the United States can do.
I think one thing that everyone should do is to sort of remind — we should remind ourselves that, in a culture that we have, where everything is instantaneous, you order something online, it can be — depending on which service you use, could be at your house in a few hours, but definitely by the next day.
We are talking about war. And we're talking about responding to war. And some of the things that have to be done and should be done, the impacts that they have don't — the impacts don't reveal themselves in an hour, in 10 hours, in a day. They take time.
And I think the more people sort of reorient themselves and realize that some of the things that the United States and the West are doing to put pressure on Putin, to bring this war to a close whenever that can happen, that this takes time, the better off we will be.
Judy Woodruff: Well, one thing is for sure. We're going to have a lot of — we're going to be watching a lot of painful scenes in Ukraine, as we watch the Ukrainian people deal with this in the hours and the days to come.
Jonathan Capehart, David Brooks, thank you both.
Jonathan Capehart: Thanks, Judy.
David Brooks: Thank you, Judy.
SUMMARY: The European Union announced its most aggressive fine yet against Google for antitrust concerns, and gave the American tech giant 90 days to make changes. European officials say Google has abused the dominance of its Android operating system to entrench its apps and services on smartphones. John Yang talks with European Commissioner for Competition Margrethe Vestager.
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SUMMARY: President Trump lobbed a volley of verbal grenades at British Prime Minister Theresa May in a tabloid interview before he arrived in the UK, saying May had botched Brexit and praising the former foreign secretary as a potential Prime Minister. Special correspondent Ryan Chilcote joins Judy Woodruff from London to discuss the fallout from the visit.
SUMMARY: Relations between the U.S. and Europe took another hit Thursday when Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said the Trump administration would impose tariffs on European steel and aluminum. European Union Ambassador to the U.S. David O'Sullivan joins John Yang to discuss how the tariffs will affect the global economy and the alliance, plus the fallout from the U.S. withdrawing from the Iran deal.
SUMMARY: Long before the Cambridge Analytica scandal, new rules were being established by the European Union to give consumers greater control over their data. Starting in May, every company, big or small, that keeps your information online or elsewhere must comply. Special correspondent Malcolm Brabant reports.
SUMMARY: Saturday's wedding between Prince Harry and American actress Meghan Markle has provided a much-needed boost for Britain’s economy during the uncertainty of its separation from the European Union. From those hawking commemorative knickknacks to the cucumber industry, special correspondent Malcolm Brabant explains what the windfall means for the U.K.
SUMMARY: French President Emmanuel Macron is on what some have called "Operation Save the Iran Deal." On a visit to the U.S., Macron will try to convince President Trump that the deal is working and that it's better to confront Iran while its nuclear program is frozen. But Trump is vowing to pull out of the deal unless the U.S. and Europe can fix it to his specifications. Nick Schifrin joins Amna Nawaz.
SUMMARY: In a state visit hosting the leader of America's oldest ally, the personal bond between President Trump and French President Emmanuel Macron was evident, and so were their differences over the Iran nuclear deal. At a news conference, Macron said the U.S. should remain part of the deal, but hold talks to improve it, while Trump said he wants an entirely new agreement. Yamiche Alcindor reports.
SUMMARY: President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin held their first face-to-face meeting since Mr. Trump took office on Friday during the G20 Summit, discussing Syria and North Korea, as well as Russian meddling in the 2016 election. Judy Woodruff learns more from special correspondent Ryan Chilcote.
SUMMARY: President Trump plans to meet with British Prime Minister Theresa May at the G20 Summit, where they'll likely discuss the fight against the Islamic State, the role of NATO and more. U.K. Defense Secretary Michael Fallon joins Judy Woodruff to discuss Russian election meddling, the promise of a Syrian cease-fire and how to counter the threat of North Korea.
SUMMARY: World leaders from 20 nations concluded their annual summit in Hamburg, Germany, on Saturday, a gathering that was dominated by discussions on trade as well as North Korea’s weapons testing. The meetings also drew tens of thousands of demonstrators who protested a range of issues. NewsHour Special Correspondent Ryan Chilcote joins Hari Sreenivasan from Germany.
SUMMARY: On his first trip abroad, President Trump met this weekend with Arab leaders in an attempt to reset relations between the U.S. and Middle East. How is this president changing U.S. foreign policy? Judy Woodruff speaks with Elliott Abrams, a former administration official under George W. Bush, Robin Wright of the United States Institute of Peace, and Daniel Benjamin of Dartmouth College.
SUMMARY: President Trump is in Israel, where he spent the day talking up peace prospects in the region. John Yang reports on the president's arrival and recaps Mr. Trump's high-profile address in Saudi Arabia over the weekend, then Judy Woodruff gets an update from Tamara Keith of NPR, who's reporting from Jerusalem.
SUMMARY: President Trump met privately with Pope Francis on Wednesday, his first audience with the leader of the Catholic Church, and with whom he has clashed publicly in the past. Last year, the religious leader disavowed Candidate Trump's pledge for a border wall, prompting Mr. Trump to dig back. Special correspondent Malcolm Brabant reports on their interaction at the Vatican.
SUMMARY: At his first meeting of NATO leaders, President Trump again criticized the allies for falling short on their share of defense spending. Mr. Trump was also the first U.S. President to not explicitly endorse NATO's collective dense clause. Special correspondent Ryan Chilcote, reporting from Brussels, joins Judy Woodruff to discuss the reactions from European leaders and more.
SUMMARY: President Trump spent the final day of his first trip abroad in Sicily at a G-7 Summit, where he met with several world leaders to discuss issues such as climate change and trade. It wrapped up a busy week with stops in Saudi Arabia, Israel and the West Bank, the Vatican and the headquarters of the European Union and NATO. Hari Sreenivasan speaks with Margaret Talev of Bloomberg News.
SUMMARY: French voters head to the polls Sunday in the second-round runoff between centrist Emmanuel Macron and far-right leader Marine Le Pen. Macron has been buoyed this week by an endorsement by former President Obama and a solid debate performance. But Le Pen's anti-immigrant party continues to press its case. Special correspondent Malcolm Brabant reports.
SUMMARY: Two candidates facing off this weekend in the French presidential election runoff offer starkly different visions for the country. Centrist Emmanuel Macron supports immigration and the European Union, while the far-right nationalist Marine Le Pen wants to curb immigration and pull France out of the EU. Special Correspondent Christopher Livesay reports from France.
SUMMARY: One of the most divisive political campaigns in French history that had much of Europe on edge came to an end during Sunday's runoff election. Centrist Emmanuel Macron defeated his controversial opponent, the right-wing populist Marine Le Pen. NewsHour Weekend Special Correspondent Malcolm Brabant joins Hari Sreenivasan from Macron's campaign headquarters in Paris.
SUMMARY: The British government formally launched the process of leaving the European Union on Wednesday, nine months after the British people voted to quit the political and economic bloc. Now the United Kingdom has two years to hammer out specific terms of its withdrawal, in negotiations that promise to be tough. Chief foreign affairs correspondent Margaret Warner reports.
SUMMARY: After the United Kingdom gave its formal notice of its intention to split from the E.U., the European Council president lamented, "There is no reason to pretend that this is a happy day." But what does Brexit mean for the British people? British Ambassador to the U.S. Kim Darroch joins Judy Woodruff to discuss the decision to break away and the path ahead.
SUMMARY: Last week, British Prime Minister Theresa May began the formal process of the United Kingdom's exit from the 28-nation European Union, nine months after British voters chose to leave the EU. This has the British citizens of Gibraltar, a 3-square-mile sliver of land in southern Spain that's more than 1,000 miles away from London, worried about effects on travel and trade regulations. NewsHour Weekend special correspondent Amy Guttman reports.
SUMMARY: Outgoing U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., Samantha Power used her final speech to focus on Russia as a major threat. Judy Woodruff sits down with Power during her last days in office to discuss troubling actions by Russia and the future of Russian relations under the Trump administration, as well as the Obama administration's complicated decision not to intervene militarily in Syria.
JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): President-elect Trump's nominee to be U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, plans to question why the U.S. contributes 22 percent of the U.N.'s budget.
In prepared remarks for her confirmation hearing tomorrow, we also learned that she will criticize the recent vote condemning Israeli settlements.
Earlier today, I sat down with Samantha Power. She's the outgoing U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. We spoke at the State Department.
And I began by asking why, in her final speech, she focused on Russia as a major threat to the U.S.
SAMANTHA POWER, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations: There is a fair amount of competition, obviously, with ISIL and the terrorist networks around the world, China also posing a different kind of threat to the rules-based order.
But I thought it was very important before leaving to draw on my eight years, our eight years here in these jobs of privilege that we have had, to take note of the pattern that has developed, particularly in the last few years, starting with the decision by President Putin to go into Ukraine, to lie about it, to take Crimea, to try to annex it, involved with that regime, itself resorting to tactics that were outlawed 100 years ago, and then systematically, in Europe, backing these illiberal parties whose world view is closer to this kind of populist authoritarian, anti-Muslim, anti-diversity kind of line that has been pursued in Moscow.
All of that plus, of course, the most recent and most egregious example that hits close to home for us, which is interfering in our elections through hacking, through fake news, and with an eye to trying to help one candidate win.
JUDY WOODRUFF: And so, when the President-elect speaks, as he has often, about wanting a better relationship with Russia — and, in fact, one of his advisers has just said in the last day or so, he said, the U.S. needs to find a way to get along better with Russia. He said, we need to focus less on combating communism and more on rejecting radical Islam.
How do you react to that?
SAMANTHA POWER: Well, let me raise my hand and say at no point have I been fighting the last war and seeking at the U.N. to combat communism.
I think we do have an interest in combating states that try to cross borders and steal parts of other people's country. We have an interest in combating tactics in war that are abhorrent and that only fuel terrorism because they incite people on the ground.
And we, as Americans, have an interest in ensuring that the only people who get to vote for our elected leaders are our citizens, and not some foreign people who think that they have an interest in skewing our election in one direction or another.
Look, I think the point that we all agree upon is that we have to engage with Russia. I have spent, you know, as much time with my Russian counterpart as I have probably with anybody else, including close family members, over the course of the last four years. And we have done really important work together.
At the same time we're at each other on Aleppo, on Ukraine, we're authorizing peacekeeping missions, putting sanctions in place on North Korea for its nuclear tests. We need to find means for cooperation.
I think the potential difference or the issue that is going to need to be adjudicated is, on what terms? Are we going to bring historical amnesia and pretend as though history is just starting on January 21, or are we going to take into account egregious violations of the rules of the road that may have — in the first instance have predated the administration, but that are inevitably going to continue if Russia believes that there are no costs to its actions, as if all it has to do is just wait out the United States, and then eventually we will soften our positions and forget about what happened?
European Union nations reacted with surprise and defiance Monday to comments by President-elect Donald Trump, who said in an interview that he believed NATO was “obsolete” and that more member states would leave the 28-nation EU.
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, speaking ahead of an EU foreign ministers meeting, said Trump's view on NATO and criticism that allied members weren't paying their fair share has “caused astonishment.”
His French counterpart Jean-Marc Ayrault added that the best response to such an interview was simple — Europeans uniting.
In Berlin, Chancellor Angela Merkel said Trump's positions have been “long known” but added: “I think we Europeans have our fate in our own hands.”
“I'm personally going to wait until the American President takes office, and then we will naturally work with him on all levels,” she told reporters.
Though Trump had made similar comments during his tempestuous election campaign, a repetition of the same points still came as a bit of a surprise since his choice for Defense Secretary, retired Marine Gen. James Mattis, stressed his support for the alliance in his U.S. congressional confirmation hearings last week.
Trump's views, in an interview with German daily Bild and The Times of London, contradict Mattis, Steinmeier said.
Trump indicated he was indifferent to whether the EU stays together or not, a sharp break from the Obama administration, which encouraged British people to vote to remain in the EU in the June referendum.
“I believe others will leave … I do think keeping it together is not gonna be as easy as a lot of people think,” Trump said in the interview.
The British exit from the EU would “end up being a great thing,” he said.
British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said it's “very good news that the United States of America wants to do a good free trade deal with us and wants to do it very fast.”
Trump was less kind to German industry officials, saying car manufacturers including BMW could face tariffs of up to 35 percent if they set up plants in Mexico instead of in the U.S. and try to export the cars to the U.S.
Such tariffs would make “the American auto industry worse, weaker and more expensive,” Sigmar Gabriel, Germany's economy minister, told Bild.
Gabriel suggested Europeans exhibit more self-confidence in dealing with Trump. “We're not weak and inferior,” he said.
BMW said Monday that the company would stick to its plans to produce cars in Mexico.
“The production is aimed at the world market,” BMW said, according to the German news agency DPA. “Therefore the plant in Mexico will complement … the production plants in Germany and China.”
SUMMARY: European officials are digesting new comments by President-elect Trump, who told two newspapers that NATO is obsolete, suggested the U.S. might drop sanctions on Russia and said he is indifferent about the future of the EU. John Yang gets reaction from Heather Conley of the Center for Strategic, and International Studies and Nicholas Burns the former U.S. Ambassador to NATO.
SUMMARY: After uncovering an illegal deal, the European Union ruled that Apple pay over $14.5 billion in back taxes to Ireland. The EU's antitrust regulator found that the country and the tech giant had made an agreement that allowed Apple to pay less than 1 percent in corporate tax for over a decade. Apple plans to appeal the decision. Hari Sreenivasan speaks with EU Commissioner Margrethe Vestager.
HARI SREENIVASAN (NewsHour): The European Commission ruled today that Ireland must collect $14.5 billion in back taxes from Apple. The announcement fueled new tensions between the U.S. and Europe over the role of multinational corporations, how they are taxed, and whether it should be considered a subsidy.
The antitrust regulator for the EU said Ireland had given Apple a sweetheart tax deal for well over a decade, with special laws that effectively allowed Apple to pay less than 1 percent corporate tax. The EU accused Apple of setting up two companies in Ireland with a head office that only exists on paper. The profits from European stores all go to the Ireland head office and are essentially untaxed.
Apple said it would appeal the decision and denied the characterization. In a statement, the company's chief executive, Tim Cook, said the European Commission is trying to — quote — “rewrite Apple's history in Europe, ignore Ireland's tax laws and upend the international tax system in the process.” The company has more than $200 billion in cash.
I spoke with Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, who announced the decision.
Ms. Vestager, thanks for joining us.
First off, what gave Apple an edge in Ireland that was unfair in the eyes of the EU?
MARGRETHE VESTAGER, European Commission: Well, we have a long longstanding prohibition of state aid, which means benefits, advantages to a selected company.
And that may come in any form, as a piece of land, a favorable loan, a grant or a tax benefit. And, of course, any member state can have their own tax legislation. We would never question that. But the thing is that you cannot give a specific company a benefit or an advantage which is not open to other companies.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Is there evidence that this was specific to Apple and not to all the other companies that are doing business in Ireland?
MARGRETHE VESTAGER: Yes, it is.
This arrangement is due to two things which are none of our concern, how Apple is organized and the Irish tax legislation. But the thing that is specific is two tax rulings — are two tax rulings that are directed specifically to Apple.
And tax rulings are, by nature, specific because they are directed from the government or from the authorities to a specific company. And this is only for them. It is not for other companies.
They say Kremlin relies on disinformation to sow discord in U.S., Europe
With a vigorous national debate under way on whether Sweden should enter a military partnership with NATO, officials in Stockholm suddenly encountered an unsettling problem: a flood of distorted and outright false information on social media, confusing public perceptions of the issue. The claims were alarming: If Sweden, a non-NATO member, signed the deal, the alliance would stockpile secret nuclear weapons on Swedish soil; NATO could attack Russia from Sweden without government approval; NATO soldiers, immune from prosecution, could rape Swedish women without fear of criminal charges.
They were all false, but the disinformation had begun spilling into the traditional news media, and as the defense minister, Peter Hultqvist, traveled the country to promote the pact in speeches and town hall meetings, he was repeatedly grilled about the bogus stories.
“People were not used to it, and they got scared, asking what can be believed, what should be believed?” said Marinette Nyh Radebo, Hultqvist's spokeswoman.
As often happens in such cases, Swedish officials were never able to pin down the source of the false reports. But numerous analysts and experts in U.S. and European intelligence point to Russia as the prime suspect, noting that preventing NATO expansion is a centerpiece of the foreign policy of President Vladimir Putin, who invaded Georgia in 2008 largely to forestall that possibility.
In Crimea, eastern Ukraine and now Syria, Putin has flaunted a modernized and more muscular military. But he lacks the economic strength and overall might to openly confront NATO, the European Union or the United States. Instead, he has invested heavily in a program of “weaponized” information, using a variety of means to sow doubt and division. The goal is to weaken cohesion among member states, stir discord in their domestic politics and blunt opposition to Russia.
“Moscow views world affairs as a system of special operations, and very sincerely believes that it itself is an object of Western special operations,” said Gleb Pavlovsky, who helped establish the Kremlin's information machine before 2008. “I am sure that there are a lot of centers, some linked to the state, that are involved in inventing these kinds of fake stories.”
The planting of false stories is nothing new; the Soviet Union devoted considerable resources to that during the ideological battles of the Cold War. Now, though, disinformation is regarded as an important aspect of Russian military doctrine, and it is being directed at political debates in target countries with far greater sophistication and volume than in the past. The flow of misleading and inaccurate stories is so strong that NATO and the EU have established special offices to identify and refute disinformation, particularly claims emanating from Russia.
The Kremlin's clandestine methods have surfaced in the United States, too, U.S. officials say, identifying Russian intelligence as the likely source of leaked Democratic National Committee emails that embarrassed Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign. The Kremlin uses both conventional media— Sputnik, a news agency, and RT, a television outlet — and covert channels, as in Sweden, that are almost always untraceable. Russia exploits both approaches in a comprehensive assault, Wilhelm Urme, a spokesman for the Swedish Security Service, said this year when presenting the agency's annual report. “We mean everything from internet trolls to propaganda and misinformation spread by media companies like RT and Sputnik,” he said.
The fundamental purpose of dezinformatsiya, or Russian disinformation, experts said, is to undermine the official version of events — even the very idea that there is a true version of events— and foster a kind of policy paralysis.
Moscow adamantly denies using disinformation to influence Western public opinion and tends to label accusations of either overt or covert threats as “Russophobia.”
“There is an impression that, like in a good orchestra, many Western countries every day accuse Russia of threatening someone,” Maria Zakharova, the Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, said at a recent ministry briefing.
Tracing individual strands of disinformation is difficult, but in Sweden and elsewhere, experts have detected a characteristic pattern that they tie to Kremlingenerated disinformation campaigns. “The dynamic is always the same: It originates somewhere in Russia, on Russia state media sites, or different websites or somewhere in that kind of context,” said Anders Lindberg, a Swedish journalist and lawyer.
“Then the fake document becomes the source of a news story distributed on far-left or far-right-wing websites,” he said. “Those who rely on those sites for news link to the story, and it spreads. Nobody can say where they come from, but they end up as key issues in a security policy decision.”
Although the topics may vary, the goal is the same, Lindberg and others suggested. “What the Russians are doing is building narratives; they are not building facts,” he said. “The underlying narrative is, ‘Don't trust anyone.'” The weaponization of information is not some project devised by a Kremlin policy expert but is an integral part of Russian military doctrine — what some senior military figures call a “decisive” battlefront.
“The role of nonmilitary means of achieving political and strategic goals has grown, and, in many cases, they have exceeded the power of force of weapons in their effectiveness,” Gen. Valery Gerasimov, the chief of the general staff of the Russian Armed Forces, wrote in 2013. A prime Kremlin target is Europe, where the rise of the populist right and declining support for the EU create an ever more receptive audience for Russia's conservative, nationalistic and authoritarian approach under Putin. Last year, the European Parliament accused Russia of “financing radical and extremist parties” in its member states, and in 2014 the Kremlin extended an $11.7 million loan to the National Front, the extreme right party in France.
“The Russians are very good at courting everyone who has a grudge with liberal democracy, and that goes from extreme right to extreme left,” said Patrik Oksanen, an editorial writer for the Swedish newspaper group MittMedia. The central idea, he said, is that “liberal democracy is corrupt, inefficient, chaotic and, ultimately, not democratic.”
Another message, largely unstated, is that European governments lack the competence to deal with the crises they face, particularly immigration and terrorism, and that their officials are all U.S. puppets.
MacFarquhar writes for The New York Times.
SUMMARY: The world was shocked when, in June, the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union. Many believe the severance will negatively affect Britain's economy, but the fishing industry expects benefits -- including increased profitability, poverty relief and elimination of what some fishermen see as harmful restrictions. From southwest England, special correspondent Jennifer Glasse has the story.
JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): There are reports that the United Kingdom's process to begin leaving the European Union may not begin until later next year, delaying the U.K.'s so-called Brexit.
The June vote to leave may have surprised many there, but it came as welcome news to the island nation's fishermen. They have long complained about European Union rules, and now they're hoping Brexit will help them revitalize a fishing industry they say was damaged by E.U. policy.
From Southwest England, special correspondent Jennifer Glasse reports.
JENNIFER GLASSE, special correspondent: Fishermen have brought their catches into Brixham Harbor since the Middle Ages, when it was the biggest fishing port in Southwest England.
The harbor and the fleet have changed over the centuries. And skipper Mike Sharp hopes there are more changes to come. That's why he voted for the U.K. to leave Europe.
MIKE SHARP, Skipper, “Emilia Jane”: We have all the Dutch, and the French, and the Belgian fishermen, and mainly the Spanish as well coming to land to take our fish out of our waters, which we want to — you know, I think we still can let them come in, but we can decide how many comes in.
JENNIFER GLASSE: European Union-mandated quotas stipulate what kind and how many fish the trawlers can bring in. Sharp and other fishermen here claim the quotas favor boats from continental Europe. E.U. rules also limited the size of fishing fleets.
MIKE SHARP: When I started fishing 30 years ago, there was 60 beam trawlers, and now there's 17. So, I would like to see it built back up.
JENNIFER GLASSE: A larger fleet could mean hundreds more jobs for deck hands, engineers, welders and; onshore, processing, buying and selling fish.
Brixham Fish Market is already the largest on England's South Coast, handling about $35 million of annual trade. This market itself was modernized in part with E.U. funds.
SUMMARY: In Istanbul, thousands of supporters of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan went out to the streets, demanding retribution for those responsible for the coup over the weekend. Meanwhile, even more Turkish civil servants were detained or suspended from their jobs. Special correspondent Marcia Biggs talks to Hari Sreenivasan about the crackdown.
HARI SREENIVASAN (NewsHour): President Obama spoke by phone today with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The U.S. Justice and State Departments are reviewing Turkey's extradition request for Fethullah Gulen, the man the country says is responsible for the attempted coup last week.
And in its aftermath, the crackdown has only intensified, with thousands more civil servants suspended from their jobs today, in addition to the thousands already under detention.
For more, we're joined now from Istanbul by special correspondent Marcia Biggs.
Marcia, you're standing in front what looks like, what — is this a pro-Erdogan rally?
MARCIA BIGGS, special correspondent: Indeed, Hari.
This is the largest protest of the last five days. The first night, as you will remember, on Friday night, when the coup was attempted, President Erdogan called on his people to come down to the streets to save democracy, as he said, to protect him, to protect the government, and this is the fifth day.
People have come down in droves every single day. And this is by far the largest. I would say maybe 3,000 people are here tonight. The mood is one of nationalism, the Turkish flags, a lot of saving the fatherland.
What is very interesting is that Erdogan sent messages, text messages to his people, to the citizens of Turkey today, saying, please come down to the streets, as he has every day, to save the fatherland, to save democracy. And out they have come.
Public transportation has been free every day. Indeed, I took the ferry and I took a tram today, paid no money, and that is to encourage people to come down into the streets.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Tell me about the impact. Is there an impact that you can feel, though, the people that you talk to can feel about all these detentions and firings?
MARCIA BIGGS: The crackdown over the last couple of days has been brutal, as you mentioned, 30,000 suspensions of various ministries, police and education.
That's the people who work in the prime minister's office, judges, prosecutors, 15,000, as you mentioned, members of the Education Ministry; 1,500 deans were asked to resign, and that's in addition to the 1,000 civilians that were arrested and the 6,000 soldiers that were arrested.
That's 50,000 people in this country that have been affected by this crackdown, whether it's being fired, whether it's being asked to resign, whether it's being detained. It's incredible.
SUMMARY: The failed coup attempt in Turkey has won that nation’s president extraordinary power, in a three-month state of emergency, to impose laws by fiat. Critics fear he will chip away at Turkey's secular constitution. Hari Sreenivasan talks with special correspondent Marcia Biggs; and Federica Mogherini, a High Representative/Vice President of the European Union.
SUMMARY: Welcome to 10 Downing Street, Theresa May. Now deal with the Brexit mess that you campaigned against. The new UK Prime Minister, who took over Wednesday from David Cameron, supported staying with the EU but the Conservative Party leader's first order of business is presiding over the divorce from Europe that British voters approved last month. Chris Ship of Independent Television News reports.
SUMMARY: Sir Peter Westmacott, the UK's former Ambassador to the United States weighs in on the past three weeks' fast-paced developments in Britain. Of the new Prime Minister, Theresa May, he describes her as grounded, no-nonsense and humble. He describes as a surprise her appointment of Boris Johnson, the pro-Brexit former mayor of London, to be foreign secretary. Gwen Ifill talks with Westmacott.
SUMMARY: Russia's game-changing moves in the Ukraine and new aggressive posture against NATO were the focus of a NewsHour series last week looking at the fault lines between Moscow and the West. Over the weekend, President Barack Obama and other leaders of the alliance met in Poland. John Yang learns more from former State Department official Esther Brimmer.
JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): We reported all last week on the fault lines between Russia and the West over the Russian-backed war in Ukraine and Moscow's new, aggressive posture against NATO.
Leaders of the North Atlantic Treaty (Organization) alliance met over the weekend in Warsaw, and we go to John Yang for an update.
JOHN YANG (NewsHour): With us now to discuss what came out of the NATO summit and the future of the alliance is Esther Brimmer. She has served in various roles at the State Department. Most recently, she was assistant secretary of state for international organization affairs. She's now with the Council on Foreign Relations and teaches at George Washington University.
Esther Brimmer, thanks for joining us.
What would this — this summit, the president said it was the most important moment for NATO since the end of the Cold War. What were the big decisions that came out of this meeting?
ESTHER BRIMMER, Former State Department Official: Indeed, this was an extremely important summit.
This was an opportunity for the leaders to demonstrate that there was real support and backing, concrete actions to support the Eastern allies of the alliance. What we saw were that the United States and other important leaders within the alliance are showing that they will commit troops again to Europe.
We're seeing the deployment of battalions in those countries that are most threatened by the new tensions with Russia. And it meant that the alliance still matters, despite the turbulence created by the Brexit vote in the European Union.
JOHN YANG: Let's take those one by one.
First of all, the troops being sent to Eastern Europe, troops once again being deployed by NATO to deter Moscow, this is sort of a return to the original purpose of the alliance.
ESTHER BRIMMER: Well, indeed.
The alliance is, of course, both a political and a military alliance to defend the territory of the NATO allies. And, once again, we see that we need to have a military presence in Europe increased. As we know, there has always been a U.S. presence within Europe, which was happily reduced after the end of the Cold War.
However, now we see that particularly the Baltic states and others are concerned about their security, recognizing the threats made by Russia against those non-NATO countries to their east. Importantly, we see that, though, this is a multilateral commitment. We see that countries of four nations will lead the effort to station rotating battalions in the eastern part of the NATO countries.
So, again, the United States, but other countries, too, are part of the response to show that the alliance as a whole is committed to the territories of those countries most under pressure.
JOHN YANG: You spoke also about the British decision to leave the European Union. What's that done to NATO?
ESTHER BRIMMER: Indeed.
As we know, that there are important institutions in the transatlantic relationship. The North Atlantic Treaty alliance, NATO, has always been the underpinning of that relationship. But the European Union has an important role in other types of security, including border issues and others.
And so the relationship between those countries are also part of transatlantic security. The United Kingdom is really the lynchpin. They're both members of NATO and members of the European Union. They have an important role to play. But they have a sovereign choice about what they were going to do. The vote for Brexit means that there is a greater interest, I think, in the United Kingdom in demonstrating their support for the transatlantic alliance and showing that they want to continue to play an important role as a key nation within the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
