Earlier this week, Ariel Cohen of Heritage had a controversial opinion article run in the New York Post, which despite its aggressive house rhetoric, makes a pretty strong point:

Russian leaders, more anti-American today than ever, have written the book on using money and energy muscle to buy friends and influence neighbors. They made an example out of Ukraine, by cutting gas supply to it on New Year’s Day for four days. They also intimidated France and Germany into bucking the US at the Bucharest NATO summit and objecting to Georgia and Ukraine being issued a North Atlantic Treaty Association membership plan. Russia’s Gazprom has hired former German Chancellor Gerhardt Schroeder as the Chairman of a pipeline consortium, and made a similar offer to former Italian Prime Minister and the top Eurocrat Romano Prodi. Vladimir Putin does brisk energy business with Silvio Berlusconi, and with the French President Nicolas Sarcozy, though both are considered pro-American. German businessmen enthusiastically lobby Chancellor Angela Merkel on the Kremlin’s behalf. Russia, some argue, has more clout today in Europe than Washington.