Russian foreign policy.

A snippet about where Russia might be headed.

From Prof. Robert Skidelsky of the U.K.'s University of Warwick.

• Today's "resurgent Russia is the world's foremost revisionist power."
• Russia needs to "balance" the West.
• Tools: nuclear weapons, energy.
• Also, establish "friendly relations with a growing coalition of disgruntled states like Venezuela, Iran and Syria."

Other options:

• "[F]oment unrest among the sizable Russian populations in Kazakhstan, Belarus and Ukraine to help bring these states back into Moscow's orbit."
• "[B]uild the Shanghai Cooperation Agreement, a loose alliance of Central Asian dictatorships plus Russia and China, into a powerful union."

"The Kremlin Wises Up. After strong-arm tactics backfire, Moscow finds smarter ways to extend its influence abroad.." By Owen Matthews, Newsweek International, 2/4/08.

H/t 2008-#19-Johnson's Russia List.