In life, the recently deceased U.S. Senator John McCain established himself as a staunch opponent of the Trump administration’s foreign policy, particularly involving Russia. Ironically, for better or for worse, he was among the top true “America First” figures in government rather than President Donald Trump. Following his death this past weekend from brain cancer, Russian state television ensured that his antagonism towards Russian aggression remained a known part of his legacy.
Russian state television condemned the Senator in their reporting on his death for his attitudes, but in so doing, offered exactly the kind of Russian coverage he would have wanted, many noted.
BBC Moscow correspondent Steve Rosenberg tweeted that state tv called McCain “an implacable opponent of Russia, who supported even tougher sanctions.”
The reporting is not wrong, even if its framing is entirely in line with the Kremlin’s interests. As recently as this month, McCain, who’d been serving as the Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee when he died, praised the U.S. government’s decision to issue new sanctions on Russia in the wake of a nerve agent attack on Russian expats in the U.K. He added at the time that “Congress must continue to exercise strong oversight to ensure these sanctions are swiftly & fully implemented.”
Good to see @StateDept moving forward with new sanctions on #Putin’s #Russia for its chemical attack in #Britain. Congress must continue to exercise strong oversight to ensure these sanctions are swiftly & fully implemented. https://t.co/y889BtivPi
— John McCain (@SenJohnMcCain) August 9, 2018
The sanctions he was speaking of include a complete ban on electronics exports to Russia. They emerged months after the Trump administration finally got around to imposing Congressionally mandated sanctions on Russia over the Kremlin’s election meddling. Those sanctions financially isolated a number of prominent Russians, including Oleg Deripaska, who was at one time an associate of former Trump campaign manager and convicted felon Paul Manafort.
In addition to that, he also cooperated this month in the introduction of a wide-ranging sanctions bill against Russia over their election meddling. McCain said that the bill “would build on the strongest sanctions ever imposed on the Putin regime for its assault on democratic institutions, violation of international treaties, and siege on open societies through cyberattacks and misinformation campaigns.”
Support for American sanctions against Russia wasn’t the only specific point on which Russian media criticized McCain.
Russia’s RT criticized the late Senator for his support of a number of American military excursions over the years, issuing a report including;
‘In his 36 years of service in Congress, McCain had acquired a reputation as a maverick Republican who was not shy about throwing American troops in harm’s way.’
Russia has a vested interest in a number of the military conflicts America has been involved in throughout the decades of McCain’s leadership. Often, they were on the other side — and in some cases, like the Syrian Civil War, they still are aligned on the other side.
Trump has touted supposed cooperation with Russian President Vladimir Putin to bring an end to that conflict, but it’s still continuing.
McCain targeted Trump over his repeated capitulation to the Russian president, commenting:
‘The damage inflicted by President Trump’s naiveté, egotism, false equivalence, and sympathy for autocrats is difficult to calculate.’
Trump though, for his part, is still continuing down the same path McCain was so worried about.
Featured Image via YouTube screenshot
