The world looks much less safe now than it did before U.S. President Donald Trump was inaugurated, but the threats are not quite what doomsters feared in January.
Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin have not become the buddies some expected. Instead the U.S.-Russia relationship has reached a new low. Russian attempts to infiltrate the U.S. administration have not made progress. Russia has not succeeded in destroying NATO.
Trump has not decided to back the Assad regime in Syria in the fight against the self-styled Islamic State. Instead Trump, in contrast to the cautious line taken by Barack Obama, reacted decisively and quickly to the Syrian use of poison gas, which killed civilians, including children, in the Syrian town of Khan Sheikhoun, by ordering a missile attack on the Syrian air base from which the attack had originated. Many saw this action as salutary and necessary, although the isolationists who wanted America to cease to intervene in conflicts where U.S. interests were not directly involved condemned it and it angered the Russians.
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