Ukraine And Russia At Gunpoint; The US Eyes Syria

Vladimir Putin and Ukraine’s leader meet. We’ll look at Russia and the high voltage chess game over Ukraine. Plus, we look at potential US military strikes in Syria and Iraq.

Ukraine’s president sat down with Vladimir Putin yesterday, and was not shy about putting Russia’s tensions with Ukraine in the most dramatic terms.  The fate of Europe and the fate of the world are being decided here, he said.  But not quickly.  Ukraine blasting separatists in the east.  Separatists parading, abusing Ukrainian POWs in public.  Russian troops captured inside Ukraine.  War talk.  And the biggest East-West crisis since the Cold War.  This hour On Point:  the dangerous chess game over Ukraine.  Plus – we look at the US lining up its bomb sights on ISIS in Syria.
-- Tom Ashbrook

Alan Cullison, Moscow correspondent for The Wall Street Journal. (@AlanCullison)

Angela Stent, director of the center for Eurasian, Russian and East European Studies at Georgetown University. Senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. Author of "The Limits of Partnership: US -Russian Relations in the Twenty-First Century." (@AngelaStent)

John Mearsheimer, co-director of the program on international security policy at the University of Chicago and professor of political science. Author of "The Tragedy of Great Power Politics," "Why Leaders Lie" and "The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy."

The Wall Street Journal: Putin Warns on Ukraine Pursuing Closer Ties With West — "Mr. Putin, however, stressed trade issues, highlighting the dangers he said Russia faces if Ukraine pursues closer ties to the West. Since the onset of the crisis, Mr. Putin has accused the West of meddling in Ukraine's internal affairs, and trying to spoil its relations with Moscow by luring it into an association agreement. "

BBC News: Ukraine crisis: 'Column from Russia' crosses border — "Ukrainian sources earlier said the armoured vehicles had crossed the border bearing symbols of the self-styled Donetsk People's Republic. Officials said 10 tanks and two armoured personnel carriers were in the column although other reports said the number of vehicles was as high as 50. Mariupol, a major port on the Azov Sea, is in the hands of Ukrainian government forces, who ousted rebels from the city in June after weeks of fighting."

New York Times: Clouding Talks, Ukraine Says It Captured Russian Troops — "Ukraine released video clips on Tuesday of what it said were captured Russian soldiers, raising tensions as President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia met in Minsk, the capital of Belarus, with his Ukrainian counterpart, President Petro O. Poroshenko. In earlier peace talks between lower-ranking officials, Moscow’s position on its role in the conflict in eastern Ukraine has prevented discussion of what Ukrainian officials regard as the key to stopping the conflict: a Russian willingness to acknowledge, and halt, its support for rebels in the cities of Luhansk and Donetsk."

Dion Nissenbaum, national security reporter for The Wall Street Journal. (@DionNissenbaum)

Faysal Itani, fellow at the Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East at the Atlantic Council. (@faysalitani)

The Guardian: US launches reconnaissance flights over Syria — "Obama has been reluctant to take military action in Syria, but the flights are being seen as laying the groundwork for extending US air strikes against Islamic State militants (Isis) into the group's stronghold of Raqqa in north-eastern Syria, where it has been leading the fight against the regime of Bashar al-Assad in a civil war that has killed almost 200,000 people."