Turkey-Russian Courtship Won't End in Marriage

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan had a meeting on Tuesday. It is not clear what precisely came of it, but it is clear what is at stake. Russia is a weakening power where the state of the economy is now the main issue, and the question of Ukraine remains at the center of its strategic concerns. Turkey is an emerging power whose current internal crisis is being managed effectively, if brutally. Both face an enormously powerful United States, uncertain of what to do with its power and acting at times in a random and unpredictable way. For Russia and Turkey, their next moves can have existential consequences. For the United States, nothing that happens to either of the two countries rises to an existential event. Distance and power greatly insulate the United States from miscalculation.