author

 
Menu
Search
 
November 22, 2024
 

Today's print edition

Home Delivery
Subscribe for more access

Meta

Constantine Pleshakov
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Jul 7, 2001
The pope as a nation breaker
If one wants to single out a decisive reason for the spectacular collapse of communism in the Soviet Union in 1985-1991, the variety of choices is staggering. The war in Afghanistan, the exhausting arms race, U.S. President Ronald Reagan, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, the food shortages, Voice of...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Jun 19, 2001
Putin plays the smile game
The first summit of U.S. President George W. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin was shaped by an indigenous American principle, "Keep smiling." Bush said he had looked the man in the eye and found him to be "very straightforward and trustworthy." Putin said he was looking forward to "a constructive...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Jun 15, 2001
Bush and Putin square off
On Saturday, U.S. President George W. Bush is meeting his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, in Ljubljana, Slovenia in what will be the first Russo-American summit of the 21st century. The issue that will dominate the talks is clear: Bush's grandiose plan for national missile defense. Like chess champs...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Jun 9, 2001
Putin picks a new gas czar
Behold, Russia has got a new czar. No, the Romanovs did not rise from their graves. No, the Russian people did not invite a Romanov cousin, Prince Charles, to claim the throne of his Russian ancestors. No, the authoritarian Russian president, Vladimir Putin, did not crown himself Vladimir I. He just...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
May 27, 2001
Big money vs. big brother?
It was recently announced that U.S. President George W. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin will hold their first summit in mid-June. This is going to be a tense conference. The ghosts of the Cold War will arrive uninvited and bring a confrontational agenda with them. Both participants, having...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
May 13, 2001
Don't take China so seriously
These days China is always in the news. If it's not the U.S. spy-plane incident, then it's Beijing's bid for the 2008 Olympics or the Chinese Communist Party's human-rights record or Beijing's bullying of Taiwan. After decades of condescending reporting on China, the international media is finally starting...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Apr 23, 2001
Moscow exiles a mogul with good taste
The Kremlin wins one: President Vladimir Putin's bitter critic, Media-Most media empire, is dead. Its assets have been transferred to pro-Kremlin stockholders, its journalists have been fired or silenced and its owner, Vladimir Gusinsky, is hiding abroad.
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Apr 7, 2001
The U-2 affair all over again
Spy-plane pilot is one of the few professions we should strongly discourage our sons from developing an interest in. Rich in experience, critically important and thrillingly challenging, it is, nevertheless, a career charged with personal and collective disaster. Along with the ongoing anxieties of parents...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Mar 26, 2001
Russians living 'la vida loca'
This semester I am teaching a Dostoevsky course. Implausible plots, stumbling dialogues, everybody in love with everybody, romantic triangles overlap like mating frogs, passions mount, money changes hands and is thrown into the fire -- the normal Dostoevsky stuff.
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Mar 8, 2001
Putin plays a bad hand well
"I was deeply touched, when he smiled and looked at us with his blue eyes, my old sweet memories flooded back to me," a middle-aged Soviet-trained Vietnamese woman told the TV crew. The blue eyes in question belonged not to a movie star, but to Russian President Vladimir Putin, who was visiting Hanoi,...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Feb 11, 2001
Yeltsin and Reagan revisited
This year there were two sad anniversaries in the first week of February: two former political superstars, U.S. President Ronald Reagan and Russian President Boris Yeltsin celebrated their birthdays in the shadow of severe health problems. Confined to hospital, they were unable to appreciate the cheering...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Jan 28, 2001
A return to chillier times?
The Cold War is dead, long live the Cold War. Such seems to be the mood in the corridors of power in Moscow. Many Russians believe the inauguration of U.S. President George W. Bush may initiate a new period of tension between Washington and Moscow
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Jan 13, 2001
Muscovites get all fired up
"Real Chechnya" -- this is how Muscovites sum up their experiences during the recent holiday season. Fortunately, except for routine scuffles ignited by the excessive consumption of alcohol, there was no fighting in the Russian capital.
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Jan 1, 2001
Much ado about nothing
In a fierce fit of free-market commercialism, ads in Moscow subway insist that the real new millennium will start today. With the economy weakened by crisis, revenues from the advent of Y2K were not as impressive as in the West, and now Russian boutiques, travel agencies and software stores are trying...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Dec 17, 2000
No place for tainted symbols
The Soviet Union is dead; long live the Soviet Union. This seems to be the current mood in the corridors of power in Moscow. Russian President Vladimir Putin has persuaded the Parliament to restore the Soviet anthem as Russia's national hymn and the czarist red banner, which was used in Soviet times...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Dec 2, 2000
The new American autism
George W. Bush, Al Gore or civil war? This is the question being asked now by alarmists, especially those with a taste for theatrical overstatement.
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Nov 18, 2000
Russia delights in U.S. electoral confusion
Delightful. This is how many Russians describe the postelection crisis in the United States. For 10 years, Russian elections have been a favorite target of the American media. Finally, Mother Russia is allowed to retaliate. The delicious irony of the moment is that two weeks earlier hardliners in the...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Nov 2, 2000
Kim's diplomatic slam dunk
Good news from North Korea. U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright presented North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il with a basketball autographed by Michael Jordan; the dictator treated the diplomat to a spectacular theatrical performance. Rejoice: Peace in East Asia is at hand.
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Oct 7, 2000
And now, the green peril?
Today, the green banner of Islam inspires almost as much fear as the red Soviet flag did several decades ago. This fear is not entirely unjustified. Of course, it would be silly to label Muslim culture "aggressive" or "intolerant"; yet too many acts of aggression and intolerance have been conducted under...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Sep 24, 2000
From lady killer to whale protector
So Japanese fishermen are banned from U.S waters. Whales rejoice, environmentalists celebrate, Texas Gov. George W. Bush loses a point, U.S., President Bill Clinton drafts a chapter for his memoir called "After Monica: Whales!", I grieve.
Two of America’s biggest debt holders are dumping Treasurys
The U.S. Treasury building in Washington. Investors in Japan and China sold a pile of U.S. debt in the last quarter, just before the U.S. presidential election.
Tokyo Metro’s overseas efforts begin in earnest with London deal
Tokyo Metro will soon have a role in the running of London's Elizabeth Line, a major train route serving the U.K.’s capital city and environs.
Russia fired experimental ballistic missile at Ukraine, Putin says
Ukrainian firefighters work on a spot following an airstrike in Dnipro on Thursday.
Ex-yokozuna Kitanofuji dies at 82
Yokozuna Kitanofuji enters the ring during the May 1970 grand sumo tournament in Tokyo.
Man charged with murder allegedly made victim date other men for money
A car carrying suspect Ryotaro Masuda, who was indicted for allegedly beating his 25-year-old girlfriend to death, leaves the Shibuya Police Station in Tokyo on Thursday.
The slow-burn success of ‘A Samurai in Time’
A 19th-century warrior gets struck by lightning and wakes to find himself in 21st-century Kyoto in Junichi Yasuda’s surprise hit “A Samurai in Time.”
Around a quarter of Japan married couples in their 20s met through dating apps
A survey released by an organization promoting “Good Couples Day” shows that 24% of couples in their 20s met their marriage partner through a dating app.
'Tokyo Swindlers': Get deep into the minds of real estate con artists
In Ko Shinjo's "Tokyo Swindlers," a group of con artists manipulates real estate giants into falsified deals within the highly competitive, quick market.
Japan, U.K. and Italy discuss inviting more countries to joint fighter project
A new concept model of a next-generation fighter jet to be jointly developed by Japan, Britain and Italy is on display in Farnborough, Hampshire, in July.
Haruki Murakami's 'The City and Its Uncertain Walls' gives deep deja vu
For “The City and Its Uncertain Walls,” translated into English by Philip Gabriel, Haruki Murakami confronts the ghosts who won't leave him alone.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?
By Kathryn Wortley

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

SWCC keeps changing with keyword ‘new challenges’
SWCC keeps changing with keyword ‘new challenges’

SPECIAL SUPPLEMENTS note

Read more

SUPPLEMENTS BINDER