Donald Trump is unwilling to get bogged down in the confrontations currently seen in Europe, in particular when it relates to Ukraine. He is doing his best to throw off this part of the agenda from the United States. That took Angela Merkel to Sochi earlier this month, the very Sochi that she was so shortsighted to ignore in February 2014.

The question “What is a new European security architecture?” now requires an immediate and clear answer.

On March 10^th of this year, at a regular meeting of the Joint Consultative Group (JCG) of the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE), A.Y. Mazur, the head of the Russian delegation, issued a statement that suspended the Russian Federation’s participation in the group’s meetings, effective March 11, 2015.  “Therefore, Russia is ending its actions in the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe, announced in 2007, completely.”