Biden and Putin break the ice

Six days into Joe Biden’s presidency, the first telephone conversation between POTUS and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin took place on Tuesday. Who took the initiative remains a tantalizing detail, given the tense Russian-American relationship and the poor personal chemistry between the two leaders, who have known each other for a decade. But the important thing is, neither was interested in oneupmanship. Their only meeting so far, 10 years ago in Moscow in March 2011, came amid then US President Barack Obama’s push to reset relations with Russia, which of course met with sudden death after Russia’s annexation of Crimea from Ukraine in 2014. They never met again. Biden disclosed in an...