You'd be picking a … fight, though. Iran is a sophisticated country, with a very sophisticated leadership. It has a range of retaliatory options that are extremely unpleasant.

They know they're sitting on a ton of gas and they're dying to develop it. They can't do it by themselves, and sanctions that prevent them from doing it would hurt Iran.

The Russians want to stay in very good graces, because there's a big pay day for them.

I'm not convinced that talks would lead anywhere. (But) in the short to medium term, they would take the pressure out of the system that's driving oil prices.

The second lesson is that we can't rely on the Europeans. We can only hope on a 50 per cent recovery of that rift. So that leaves us with constructing issue-based coalitions of the willing as the key component of future US foreign policy.

Russia keeps Belarus within the family. This is a country that continues to look to Moscow for guidance and remains under the shadow of Russian power.