Monday NatSec Roundup

One good test is worth a thousand expert opinions

• Really interesting brief on how Russia structures its foreign policy around different kinds of narratives. The “Russia as defender of traditionalist orthodoxy” is particular interesting in context of Russian electoral interference across Europe and North America.
• Israel is stepping up its activity in Syria. There’s obviously some concern that Iran’s more assertive behavior with respect to Saudi Arabia is going to bleed over into other areas of its foreign policy, but then there’s also the point that Syria has basically become essentially just a set of targets for other countries to bomb at leisure.
• Norks keeping up with the testing, as Trump makes increasingly desperate overtures for talks.
• FWIW, it appears that the American public’s tolerance for war crimes has declined substantially since the Vietnam period.
• A bit of history regarding the latest crux in the Japan-South Korea spat, the Rising Sun flag.
• Looks like the US once again is sporting an intermediate-range ballistic missile. The INF is well and truly dead. Also take a listen to ArmsControlWonk on the same subject…