It was a classic Russian power play with echoes of Cold War gamesmanship. Shortly after entering into service in 2019, Russia’s most advanced warship made a goodwill tour of the Caribbean, armed with cruise missiles, air defense systems and other weapons. But when the Admiral Gorshkov sailed into the port of Havana, it was closely tailed by a Russian rescue tugboat — a sign to many that Moscow doubted the vessel’s reliability and the visit was nothing more than a feeble effort to project power. Russia is once again rattling its saber amid rising tensions over Ukraine, hinting that the U.S. refusal to heed its demands could spur closer military cooperation with allies in Latin America. In recent days, several senior Russian officials have warned Moscow could deploy troops or military assets to Cuba and Venezuela if the U.S. and NATO insist on meddling on Russia’s doorstep. U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan quickly dismissed Russia’s tit-for-tat threats. On the heels of its massive troop buildup on its border with Ukraine, Russia’s ability to mobilize troops in the Western Hemisphere, thousands of miles away, is limited at best, experts contend. “This is pure misdirection and it’s not fooling anyone,” said Kevin Whitaker, a former U.S. ambassador to Colombia who also served as a diplomat in Venezuela, Nicaragua and as head of the Office of Cuban Affairs in Washington. “It’s not real power projection. It’s a showpiece and nothing more.” But even if talk of troop deployments is mostly bluster, Russia’s strategic buildup in Latin America is real, posing national security threats in what generations of U.S. policy makers have referred to as “Washington’s backyard.” In the past decade, as the U.S. influence in the region has waned, Moscow — and to a lesser extent other far-flung adversaries like China and Iran — have quietly cemented ties with authoritarian governments in Nicaragua, Cuba and Venezuela through a mix of weapons sales, financing deals and intense diplomatic engagement. Moscow helped Venezuela design a cryptocurrency, forgave a $35 billion Cuba debt and runs a high-tech anti-narcotics compound in Nicaragua that many believe is a covert beachhead for spying across the region. Time and again, Russia has shown a willingness to leverage its sizable military whenever it has felt threatened by the U.S. In 2008, Moscow sent a pair of Tu-160 nuclear-capable bombers to Venezuela amid tensions with the U.S. over Russia’s brief war with Georgia, a deployment followed that year by the arrival of the “Peter the Great” warship. Russia sent more Tu-160s in 2018 as relations with the West plunged to post-Cold War lows over Ukraine, and the military even hinted it was considering setting up an air base on tiny La Orchilla Island, so small that landing military aircraft there would have been nearly impossible. Even in countries friendlier to the U.S., like Mexico and Colombia, Russia has been accused of spying or engaging in disinformation campaigns to shape elections. A senior Colombian military official recently traveled to Washington to brief U.S. officials on Russian attempts to penetrate the communications of the country’s top military command, a person familiar with the visit told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive issue. On social media, the Spanish-language arm of the Russian state-controlled RT television network has more […]

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