Russia is both a tragedy and a menace. In the Financial Times this week Sergey Karaganov offered an arresting insight into the blend of self-pity and braggadocio currently at work in Moscow. It is as depressing as it is disturbing. Western policy makers seem to believe the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (known as Isis) is the greater danger. But Russia is the nuclear-armed rump of a former superpower and, ruled by an amoral autocrat, it frightens me even more. For Europe and, I believe, the US, there is no greater foreign policy question than how to deal with today’s Russia.
俄羅斯既是一場悲劇，也是一個威脅。近日的英國《金融時報》上，謝爾蓋?卡拉加諾夫(Sergey Karaganov)發表了一篇引人入勝的文章，深刻闡述了莫斯科相互交織的自憐與自負情緒。文中的內容既讓人沮喪，也讓人不安。西方政策制定者似乎相信“伊拉克與黎凡特伊斯蘭國”(ISIS)的危險性更大。但前身是超級大國、擁有核武器、由一個無道德感的獨裁者統治的俄羅斯更讓我恐懼。對歐洲來說，如何應對當今的俄羅斯是最大的外交政策難題，在我看來對美國來說也是如此。