THE HINDU Editorial Vocabulary - March 28, 2018 - Topic 2
Russia, a rogue nation?
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 fellow Republicans. He apparently did not deem the nerve
agent attack a subject deserving of mention on that phone call. Yet, shortly
thereafter he replaced National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster with John
Bolton, a long-standing Russia hawk. What would concern democracy-minded
Americans is that the expulsion of Russian diplomats might serve as an easy
distraction device in the ongoing investigation into whether Mr. Trump or his
associates colluded with Russian entities to influence the 2016 presidential
election. Whatever the true intentions of the current U.S. administration are,
it would be naive to assume that Moscow will miss any opportunity to tighten
its strategic grip on global geopolitics, whether in terms of influencing
foreign elections, undermining Western coalition forces in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan,
or shadow manoeuvres that exacerbate instability in the context of North Korea
and Iran. Contrarily, it is imperative that the West, perhaps led by the U.S.
or the EU, find some means to bring Mr. Putin to the negotiating table, the
corollary of which is that he must eschew his current preference for political
subversion.
Vocabulary
Clutch: grasp or seize (something)
tightly or eagerly.
Example: He
stood clutching a microphone
Synonyms: grip, grasp, clasp, cling
to, hang on to, clench, hold
Suspicion: a feeling or thought that
something is possible, likely, or true.
Example: She
had a sneaking suspicion that he was laughing at her
Synonyms: intuition, feeling, impression, inkling, hunch, fancy
Expulsion: the action of depriving
someone of membership in an organization.
Expulsion from school
Synonyms: removal, debarment, dismissal, exclusion, discharge
Purge: an abrupt or violent removal
of a group of people from an organization or place.
Example: A
purge of the ruling class is absolutely necessary
Synonyms: removal, expulsion, ejection, exclusion, eviction, dismissal
Covert: not openly acknowledged or
displayed.
Example: Covert
operations against the dictatorship
Synonyms: secret, furtive, clandestine, surreptitious, stealthy
Propaganda: information, especially of a
biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular
political cause or point of view.
Example: He
was charged with distributing enemy propaganda
Synonyms: information, promotion, advertising, publicity, spin
Prohibit: formally forbid something by
law, rule, or other authority.
Example: Laws
prohibiting cruelty to animals
Synonyms: forbid, ban, bar, interdict, proscribe, make
illegal, embargo
Expulsion: the action of depriving
someone of membership in an organization.
Example: Expulsion
from school
Synonyms: removal, debarment, dismissal, exclusion, discharge
Strategic: relating to the
identification of long-term or overall aims and interests and the means of
achieving them.
Example: The
company should take strategic actions to cope with fundamental changes in the
environment
Synonyms: planned, calculated, tactical, politic, judicious
Perhaps: used to express uncertainty
or possibility.
Example: Perhaps
I should have been frank with him
Synonyms: maybe, for all one
knows, it could be, it may be
Subversion: dishonest or fraudulent
conduct by those in power, typically involving bribery.
Example: The
journalist who wants to expose corruption in high places
Synonyms: dishonesty, unscrupulousness, double-dealing, fraud
