Putin versus McCain: It’s getting personal
Fresh off his war of words with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Russia’s once-and-future President Vladimir Putin is calling out another senior U.S. politician: Sen. John McCain (R-AZ). Unlike Clinton, who doesn’t actually want to be trading insults with Putin in the press, McCain relishes these types of confrontations. In fact, McCain might have even ...
Fresh off his war of words with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Russia's once-and-future President Vladimir Putin is calling out another senior U.S. politician: Sen. John McCain (R-AZ).
Fresh off his war of words with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Russia’s once-and-future President Vladimir Putin is calling out another senior U.S. politician: Sen. John McCain (R-AZ).
Unlike Clinton, who doesn’t actually want to be trading insults with Putin in the press, McCain relishes these types of confrontations. In fact, McCain might have even started it when he tweeted on Dec. 6, "Dear Vlad, The ArabSpring is coming to a neighborhood near you."
That was a reference to the anti-Putin rallies in Moscow to protest Russia’s parliamentary elections, which Clinton called "not free and fair."
On Thursday, Putin insulted McCain during a TV call-in show.
"He has the blood of peaceful civilians on his hands, and he can’t live without the kind of disgusting, repulsive scenes like the killing of Qaddafi," Putin said.
Putin then took his insults one step further, accusing McCain of losing his marbles when he was a prisoner of war in Vietnam.
"Mr. McCain was captured and they kept him not just in prison, but in a pit for several years," said Putin. "Anyone [in his place] would go nuts."
McCain responded Thursday morning on Twitter, writing, "Dear Vlad, is it something I said?"
Putin didn’t even address McCain’s comments at the Foreign Policy Initiative Forum on Tuesday in Washington, when he accused the entire Russian government of corruption.
"I think this a corrupt system — an oligarchy…. This is a kleptocracy. It’s certainly not a representative government," McCain told the forum.
Josh Rogin covers national security and foreign policy and writes the daily Web column The Cable. His column appears bi-weekly in the print edition of The Washington Post. He can be reached for comments or tips at josh.rogin@foreignpolicy.com.
Previously, Josh covered defense and foreign policy as a staff writer for Congressional Quarterly, writing extensively on Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantánamo Bay, U.S.-Asia relations, defense budgeting and appropriations, and the defense lobbying and contracting industries. Prior to that, he covered military modernization, cyber warfare, space, and missile defense for Federal Computer Week Magazine. He has also served as Pentagon Staff Reporter for the Asahi Shimbun, Japan's leading daily newspaper, in its Washington, D.C., bureau, where he reported on U.S.-Japan relations, Chinese military modernization, the North Korean nuclear crisis, and more.
A graduate of George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs, Josh lived in Yokohama, Japan, and studied at Tokyo's Sophia University. He speaks conversational Japanese and has reported from the region. He has also worked at the House International Relations Committee, the Embassy of Japan, and the Brookings Institution.
Josh's reporting has been featured on CNN, MSNBC, C-Span, CBS, ABC, NPR, WTOP, and several other outlets. He was a 2008-2009 National Press Foundation's Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellow, 2009 military reporting fellow with the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism and the 2011 recipient of the InterAction Award for Excellence in International Reporting. He hails from Philadelphia and lives in Washington, D.C. Twitter: @joshrogin
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