Back to Containment: Dealing With Putin's Regime

[4], ii, 138 pages. Footnotes. Publisher's ephemera laid in. Cover has slight wear and soiling. David J. Kramer (born 1964) was United States Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor from 2008 to 2009. He was President of Freedom House from October 2010 to November 2014, and later worked at the McCain Institute. Following a professorship at the Florida International University, he became executive director of the George W. Bush Institute. Kramer began his government service in April 2000, when he joined the United States Department of State as Executive Director of the United States Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy. In June 2001, he served as Special Advisor to the Under Secretary of State for Global Affairs Paula Dobriansky. In October 2003, Kramer became a professional staff member for the Policy Planning Staff. From July 2005 to March 2008, he was Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs. In 2008, President of the United States George W. Bush nominated Kramer as Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, and, after confirmation, he held this office to January 20, 2009. In his book, Back to Containment, published in 2017, Kramer excoriated various elder statesmen of the United States, such as Henry Kissinger, for undertaking hybrid back-channel efforts to re-approach Russia, accusing them of violation of the Logan Act. Kramer contends that these actions undermined American security vis-a-vis Russia and the region, citing Kissinger's inclusion into Myrotvorets, Ukraine's blacklist. The McCain Institute for International Leadership at Arizona State University has released a book by Affiliated Senior Fellow David J. Kramer, "Back to Containment: Dealing with Putin's Regime." Kramer is the Institute's former Senior Director for Human Rights and Democracy and was previously President of Freedom House. In his first book, Kramer traces the rise of Vladimir Putin and the U.S.-Russia relationship over the course of the administrations of Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama. He argues that the Putin regime is a serious threat to the United States and the Western world and that the United States needs to develop a tougher policy of containment and pushback. Kramer, who wrote the book while at the McCain Institute, was afterwards a Senior Fellow at Florida International University's Steven J. Green School of International and Public Affairs in the Vaclav Havel Program for Human Rights and Diplomacy.…