{"id":304004,"date":"2017-04-16T16:02:34","date_gmt":"2017-04-16T15:02:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/trump-uses-tiny-nation-to-insult-russia\/"},"modified":"2017-04-16T16:02:34","modified_gmt":"2017-04-16T15:02:34","slug":"trump-uses-tiny-nation-to-insult-russia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/trump-uses-tiny-nation-to-insult-russia\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump Uses Tiny Nation to Insult Russia"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>In another affront to Russia, President Trump has signed onto Montenegro\u2019s entrance into NATO, as the neocon\/liberal-hawk strategy of encircling Russia resumes, writes Ted Snider.<\/p>\n<p>By Ted Snider<\/p>\n<p>Donald Trump has just approved <a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/us-usa-nato-montenegro-idUSKBN17D1XL\">Montenegro\u2019s accession into NATO<\/a>, the latest sign that hopes for a new d\u00e9tente with Russia have been dashed. Though Montenegro is a tiny nation and its inclusion doesn\u2019t significantly affect NATO\u2019s capabilities, the move does send a clear message to Moscow that Trump is continuing his reversal from his campaign promises of warming up to Russia and cooling off to NATO into the opposite.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_17202\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/sigla_nato_1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/plugins\/lazy-load\/images\/1x1.trans.gif\" data-lazy-src=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/sigla_nato_1-300x162.jpg\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-17202\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"162\" srcset=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/sigla_nato_1-300x162.jpg 300w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/sigla_nato_1-260x140.jpg 260w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/sigla_nato_1-160x86.jpg 160w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/sigla_nato_1.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\"\/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-17202\" src=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/sigla_nato_1-300x162.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"162\" srcset=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/sigla_nato_1-300x162.jpg 300w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/sigla_nato_1-260x140.jpg 260w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/sigla_nato_1-160x86.jpg 160w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/sigla_nato_1.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\"\/><\/noscript><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">NATO headquarters in Brussels, Belgium.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>The script got flipped, in part, because Democrats and the major U.S. news media battered Trump for months after his election with allegations portraying him as Russia\u2019s \u201cManchurian candidate.\u201d Despite the lack of evidence that Trump\u2019s campaign had colluded with Moscow, the steady pounding \u2013 day after day \u2013 took its toll, leading to Trump\u2019s capitulation in early April as signified by his missile strike against Syria and his new hostile rhetoric toward the Kremlin.<\/p>\n<p>However, even before Trump\u2019s springtime flip-flop, his administration had been signaling that the new President wouldn\u2019t change the arc of U.S. foreign policy very much. Immediately upon assuming the role of Secretary of Defense on Jan. 20, retired Marine General James Mattis <a href=\"http:\/\/www.politico.eu\/article\/us-defense-secretary-james-mattis-calls-nato-chief-jens-stoltenberg\/\">called NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg<\/a> to assure him of America\u2019s commitment to \u201cthe fundamental and enduring value of NATO for the security of both Europe and North America.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>While they were talking, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.dw.com\/en\/german-belgian-troops-arrive-in-vilnius-as-part-of-nato-deployment\/a-37259704\">NATO was building up its forces along Russia\u2019s borders<\/a> as German and Belgian troops moved into Lithuania supposedly to act as a deterrent against Russian \u201caggression.\u201d In mid-February, <a href=\"http:\/\/abcnews.go.com\/International\/wireStory\/500-us-troops-arrive-romania-bolster-defense-45478246\">500 U.S. troops deployed to Romania<\/a> and another <a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/us-nato-defence-usa-bulgaria-idUSKBN15U23R\">120 were deployed to Bulgaria<\/a> as part of the NATO operation known as Atlantic Resolve.<\/p>\n<p>Russian Deputy Foreign Minister, Alexi Meshkov, revealed Russia\u2019s interpretation of the NATO buildup when he said, \u201cThis deployment is of course <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/news\/world\/russia-labels-nato-moves-eastern-europe-threat-state-media-n718726\">a threat<\/a> for us.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>At the same time, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtontimes.com\/news\/2017\/jan\/16\/us-marines-deployed-near-russian-borders\/\">300 U.S. Marines were arriving in&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/2017\/04\/16\/trump-uses-tiny-nation-to-insult-russia\/\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In another affront to Russia, President Trump has signed onto Montenegro\u2019s entrance into NATO, as the neocon\/liberal-hawk strategy of encircling Russia resumes, writes Ted Snider. By Ted Snider Donald Trump has just approved Montenegro\u2019s accession into NATO, the latest sign that hopes for a new d\u00e9tente with Russia have been dashed. Though Montenegro is a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2524,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-304004","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304004","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2524"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=304004"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304004\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=304004"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=304004"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=304004"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}