Roger Cohen: Testing Times for the Transatlantic Partnership

On March 6, 2014, Roger Cohen, columnist for The New York Times, discussed the difficulties in the transatlantic relationship following the NSA spying revelations and the challenges posed by Russian incursions into Ukraine. Reflecting on his career choice, Cohen explained that his early love for writing led him to a career in journalism.

Receiving his news agency training from Reuters, Mr. Cohen moved to The Wall Street Journal and then to The New York Times where he was often on assignment as a foreign news correspondent, covering international stories in Rome, Brazil, Bosnia, and other parts of the world.

When asked about the most impactful stories of his career, Mr. Cohen explained that the Bosnia war had left "indelible imprints."  His firsthand accounts of the conflict, where violence and bloodshed were commonplace, broadened his perspectives to include instances where diplomacy “sometimes needed force.”  Relaying a story of a meeting with Slobodan Milošević, Mr. Cohen explained that when US diplomat Richard Holbrooke met Milošević, he arrived flanked by generals, creating an “impressive sight.”  When negotiations paused and the decision to use force was applied, “within days Milošević was ready to negotiate and within months it was over."

Turning to Ukraine, host Nicholas Burns paraphrased Cohen saying, “Putin has gone to war because Ukraine had the audacity to seek a trade agreement [with the EU].”  Cohen explained that the catalyst for the conflict had been the desire for Ukraine to access greater global trade.  It was not caused by dangers to Russians living in Crimea, nor by threats to the Russian fleet in the area, nor by a desire to join the European Union or NATO, Cohen noted.  Rather, the question was “whether this European society [Ukraine] can live as a part of Europe.”  Cohen sensed that Ukrainians aspire to the laws, democracy, and free trade EU member states enjoy, which contrasts a perpetual stasis of remaining within “the fraternal orbit of Russia.”

The following discussion raised a number questions from Putin's global intentions, possible outcomes to the Ukrainian conflict, and the role of public opinion in shaping American policy dialogue. Cohen acknowledged that President Obama was unlikely to use America's power assertively but was more poised to listen to domestic desires to manage the appropriate levels of global interaction.  Other issues of discussion included the historic slight felt by Putin and his generation after the reunification of Germany in NATO. But not all was gloom and doom in international politics today, Cohen concluded: Progress toward a freer and more democratic South America made him an optimist, as his recent travel in the region had been in sharp in contrast to developments chronicled in his early reporting days.