U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis has accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of making international "mischief."
In a June 28 speech commemorating the 70th anniversary of the Marshall Plan to rebuild Europe after World War II, Mattis said the Russian "leader making mischief beyond Russian borders will not restore their fortunes or rekindle their hope."
Mattis made the speech at the George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany.
Mattis said Russia has chosen to challenge the "secure and peaceful" postwar order -- sending relations between Moscow and the West to lows unseen since the Cold War amid rancor over Moscow’s seizure of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in March 2014, its backing of separatists in eastern Ukraine, its alleged interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, and other issues.
