A renewed challenge for Trump: Turkey and its new Russian missiles

While Washington remained transfixed by Michael Cohen’s testimony to Congress and lingering questions about Moscow’s interference in U.S. politics, Russia flexed its muscles, with Turkey’s foreign minster declaring that a long-disputed plan to buy Russian missiles was a “done deal.”

The purchase of the missiles, Russian S-400s, is a slap in the face to Washington, which has long opposed the purchase. As a member of NATO, Turkey’s use of Russian missiles would jeopardize the alliance’s integrated defenses by adopting technology that is incompatible and potentially compromised by Moscow — the very adversary that NATO was formed to guard against.