档案-国务卿安东尼布林肯，左，与参议员罗布波特曼，俄亥俄州共和党，钻机...

纽约——随着俄罗斯加强对邻国的侵略乌克兰本周早些时候，俄亥俄州共和党参议员罗布·波特曼抨击弗拉基米尔·普京总统的挑衅行为“明显违反了国际法”

参议院乌克兰核心小组的共同主席敦促拜登政府与盟友合作，“确保对这种对乌克兰主权领土的无端持续入侵做出协调一致的回应。”

但是，一位竞选接替退休的波特曼的共和党人传达了一个非常不同的信息。

“老实说，我真的不在乎乌克兰会发生什么，”万斯在一次播客采访中说。“我烦透了乔·拜登专注于一个我不关心的国家的边界，而他却让自己国家的边界成为全面战区。"

对欧洲几十年来最重大的外交政策危机的不同反应，反映了一个分裂的——并且迅速变化的——共和党。主要集中在华盛顿的保守派长期以来一直警告俄罗斯的侵略行为，他们正面临着新一代保守派的挑战，这些保守派公开质疑美国为什么应该关心俄罗斯的举动。

“所有这些人都是在一个以强硬对抗俄罗斯为主要方针的党内出现的，”共和党资深策略师道格·叶禾谈到这种分歧时说。"这表明我们的政治在过去几年里变得多么任性。"

在普京周四在乌克兰发动军事行动后，共和党的外交政策变得更加紧迫。在那次行动之前，该党的分裂提醒人们，唐纳德·特朗普(Donald Trump)在离开白宫后很久仍对共和党有着持久的影响。

这位前总统仍然是共和党阵营中最受欢迎的人物，他已经在下周开始的中期初选中发挥了他的影响力，因为他正在戏弄另一场总统竞选。这些竞选可能会产生志同道合的共和党人，他们将在秋季竞选中接替波特曼这样的外交政策传统主义者。

周四在佛罗里达州举行的年度保守派政治行动会议预览了未来的发展，因为领导人将他们的愤怒集中在总统乔·拜登对外交政策的处理和普京打破常规的侵略上。

特朗普手下的前副国家安全顾问K.T麦克法兰(K.T. McFarland)说，“我认为，在某种程度上，我们的国家领导层可能不具备犯罪能力。”。“他们无法阻止弗拉基米尔·普京的所作所为。”

在扇美国总统耳光的同时，她对俄罗斯领导人提出了更严重的担忧。

“我担心的不仅仅是乌克兰。事情还在继续，”麦克法兰说。“他下一步会威胁北约吗?他毕生的目标是解散北约，把美国和欧洲分开，重建苏联。”

就目前而言，质疑美国为什么应该关心乌克兰安全的人仍然是保守运动中很小的一部分，尽管他们具有很高的影响力和发言权。国会共和党人，特别是参议院的共和党人，在很大程度上团结一致，反对俄罗斯的侵略，阿肯色州参议员汤姆·科顿(Tom Cotton)等一些人主张采取更具侵略性的姿态，并称拜登的回应“胆怯”且“完全不符合这一时刻”。

随着关键的中期选举年紧张局势加剧，几乎所有人都越来越多地批评拜登。

但是那些拒绝美国参与的人有强大的平台。福克斯新闻频道主持人塔克·卡尔森是该电视台最大的明星，每晚有数百万观众，他一再质疑为什么保卫乌克兰很重要，甚至问为什么美国应该站在他们一边而不是普京一边。

著名保守派评论员坎迪斯·欧文斯(Candace Owens)走得更远，公开鹦鹉学舌普京的谈话要点。

“我建议每一个想知道俄罗斯和乌克兰到底发生了什么的美国人，读一读普京演讲的文字记录。正如我几个月来所说的那样——北约(在美国的指导下)正在违反以前的协议并向东扩张。我们有错，”她周二在推特上写道。

周三晚上，随着爆炸声响彻基辅、哈尔科夫和乌克兰其他地区，特朗普称现场为“可怕的局面”，并坚称普京绝不会在他的监督下移动。

“他看到了本届政府的软弱、无能和愚蠢。作为一名美国人，我对此感到愤怒和难过，”他在劳拉·英格拉哈姆的福克斯新闻频道秀上说道。“对世界、对这个国家来说，这是一件非常悲伤的事情，对于许多将要被无谓地杀害的人来说，这当然是非常悲伤的。”

这与他最初对普京升级的公开回应不同，在接受“克莱·特拉维斯和巴克·塞克斯顿秀”采访时，他没有明确谴责，而是反复称赞俄罗斯领导人的悟性。

批评者认为，在特朗普一再努力推翻2020年选举结果以继续掌权后，这种心态表明该党更倾向于威权主义并采取反民主行动。

“他们基本上是在宣布支持独裁主义者和独裁者，而且他们似乎对这种统治不会有意见，”曾在白宫为副总统迈克·彭斯提供建议的国家安全专家奥利维亚·特罗伊(Olivia Troye)说。“我认为美国人可能对如何更好地继续下去有不同意见。但我们应该成为支持自由和民主的统一战线。”

“共和党人反俄怎么了?”她补充道。“这是过去的事情。”

从第一次总统竞选的早期开始，特朗普就对共和党的传统外交政策立场进行了戏剧性的改革。他在2016年获胜，部分原因是反对伊拉克和阿富汗的“永久战争”，认为美国从新保守主义乔治·w·布什时代的干预主义和国家建设中获益甚少。他采取了内向的“美国第一”主义，试图利用强硬的言论和不可预测性来吓退潜在的侵略者。

与此同时，特朗普拥抱普京，称赞他并诋毁北约，北约是美国外交政策的基石，因为它是为了对抗俄罗斯而成立的。

2016年，他的盟友努力从共和党平台上删除支持向乌克兰提供武器的语言。他多次在美国情报机构关于俄罗斯干预2016年美国总统选举的结论上站在普京一边。这种拥抱对俄罗斯观察家来说是如此令人困惑，以至于一些人越来越相信唯一合理的解释是普京有一些关于他的丑闻，这种猜测从未得到证实。

特朗普第一次被弹劾是因为在2020年大选前向乌克兰施压调查拜登，同时扣留军事援助。

他的任期与公众舆论的相应变化重叠。盖洛普发现，在特朗普担任总统期间，将俄罗斯称为朋友或盟友的共和党人的比例大幅上升，从2014年的22%上升到2018年的40%。民主党人对这种关系的看法基本保持不变。

如今，美国人很少支持美国在俄乌冲突中发挥重要作用，共和党人就更少了。美联社-NORC公共事务研究中心的一项新民意调查发现，只有22%的共和党人认为美国应该在这场冲突中发挥主要作用，而民主党人的比例为32%。

与民主党人相比，共和党人也不太可能表示他们非常或非常担心俄罗斯在世界各地的影响力对美国构成直接威胁。

共和党政治策略师兼民调专家亚当·盖勒(Adam Geller)警告称，尽管在最近的选举中，国内问题通常比外交政策发挥着更具决定性的作用，但这种情况可能会改变。

他说，“如果欧洲将要爆发一场大战，它将很快在选民心目中的问题矩阵中上升。”

他说，这对拜登来说是个坏消息，这让共和党人和那些投票给拜登的独立人士都感到振奋，因为他承诺恢复到特朗普之前的常态。

但莱斯大学(Rice University)历史学教授道格拉斯·布林克利(Douglas Brinkley)表示，还有更大的问题在起作用，他称共和党质疑支持乌克兰以及最终支持北约的必要性是前所未有的。

“这违背了几代人的外交决策，”他说。"北约是美国所有外交政策的核心和灵魂。"

“你破坏了北约，世界上就没有美国的存在，”他补充道。"这不是关于外交政策的争吵。"

Russia conflict separates GOP traditionalists from newcomers

NEW YORK -- As Russia intensified its aggression toward neighboringUkraineearlier this week, Republican Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio blasted President Vladimir Putin’s provocations as a “clear violation of international law.”

The co-chair of the Senate’s Ukraine Caucus urged the Biden administration to work with allies to “ensure a coordinated response to this unwarranted continued incursion on sovereign territory of Ukraine.”

But one of the Republicans running to replace the retiring Portman had a very different message.

“I gotta be honest with you, I don’t really care what happens to Ukraine one way or another,” J.D. Vance said in a podcast interview. “I’m sick ofJoe Bidenfocusing on the border of a country I don’t care about while he lets the border of his own country become a total war zone.”

The divergent responses to Europe’s most significant foreign policy crisis in generations reflects a divided — and rapidly changing — Republican Party. An old guard, largely centered in Washington, that has long warned of Russian aggression is confronting an ascendant generation of conservatives who openly question why the U.S. should care about Russia's moves at all.

“All of these people came up in a party where standing up tough against Russia was a prime directive," Doug Heye, a longtime GOP strategist, said of the divide. "It shows how our politics have gotten wayward over the last few years.”

The GOP's approach to foreign policy took on new urgency after Putin on Thursday launched a military operation in Ukraine. In the runup to that action, the party's division was a reminder of Donald Trump's enduring impact on the GOP long after his departure from the White House.

The former president remains the most popular figure among the GOP base and is already wielding his influence in the midterm primaries that begin next week as he teases another presidential run. Those races could yield similarly minded Republicans who will head into the fall campaign positioned to succeed foreign policy traditionalists like Portman.

The annual Conservative Political Action Conference that got underway in Florida on Thursday offered a preview of what’s to come as leaders focused their ire on both President Joe Biden's handling of foreign policy and Putin's norm-breaking aggression.

“We have a national leadership that I think at a certain point is probably criminally incompetent," said K.T. McFarland, the former deputy national security adviser under Trump. “They are unable to stop what Vladimir Putin is doing.”

While slapping at the American president, she raised more serious concerns about Russia's leader.

“My concern is it doesn’t just stop with Ukraine. It goes on,” McFarland said. “Will he next threaten NATO? His lifelong objective has been to dismantle NATO, to separate the United States from Europe and to recreate the Soviet Union.”

For now, those questioning why the U.S. should care about Ukrainian security remain a small, if highly influential and vocal segment of the conservative movement. Congressional Republicans, especially those in the Senate, have been largely united in speaking out against Russian aggression, with some like Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas advocating a more aggressive posture and calling Biden’s response “timid” and “wholly unequal to this moment.”

Almost all have become increasingly critical of Biden as tensions ramp up during a crucial midterm election year.

But those dismissing American involvement have powerful platforms. Fox News host Tucker Carlson, the network's biggest star, who reaches several million viewers each night, has repeatedly questioned why defending Ukraine is important and even asked why the U.S. should side with them and not Putin.

Candace Owens, a prominent conservative commentator, has gone even further, openly parroting Putin’s talking points.

“I suggest every American who wants to know what’s (asterisk)actually(asterisk) going on in Russia and Ukraine, read this transcript of Putin’s address. As I’ve said for month — NATO (under direction from the United States) is violating previous agreements and expanding eastward. WE are at fault,” she tweeted Tuesday.

On Wednesday night, as the sound of explosions rang out through Kyiv, Kharkiv and other areas of Ukraine, Trump called the scene a “terrible situation" and insisted Putin never would have moved on his watch.

“He sees the weakness and the incompetence and the stupidity of this administration. And as an American I'm angry about it and I'm saddened by it,” he said, calling into Laura Ingraham’s Fox News show. “It’s a very sad thing for the world, for the country, and it's certainly very sad for a lot of people that are going to be needlessly killed."

It was a departure from his initial public response to Putin’s escalation, in which he offered no clear condemnation and repeatedly praised the Russian leader’s savvy in an interview on “The Clay Travis & Buck Sexton Show.”

Critics see that mindset as symptomatic of the party's larger drift toward authoritarianism and embrace of anti-democratic action after Trump’s repeated efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election to remain in power.

“They're basically declaring their support for authoritarians and dictators and they don’t seem to have a problem with that type of ruling coming to America,” said Olivia Troye, a national security expert who advised Vice President Mike Pence in the Trump White House. “I think Americans can disagree about how best to proceed. But we should be a united front in support of freedom and democracy.”

“What happened to Republicans being anti-Russia?" she added. “That used to be the thing.”

From the early days of his first presidential campaign, Trump has overseen a dramatic overhaul of the GOP's traditional foreign policy stance. He won in 2016, in part, by running against the “forever wars” in Iraq and Afghanistan, arguing the country had gained little from the interventionism and nation-building of the neoconservative George W. Bush era. He adopted an inward-looking “America First” doctrine that sought to use a combination of tough talk and unpredictability to scare off would-be aggressors.

At the same time, Trump embraced Putin, complimenting him and denigrating NATO, the cornerstone of U.S. foreign policy since it was founded to counter Russia.

In 2016, his allies worked to strip language from the GOP platform that supported giving weapons to Ukraine. He repeatedly sided with Putin over U.S. intelligence agencies’ conclusions about Russia’s meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. The embrace was so baffling to Russia watchers that some grew convinced the only plausible explanation was that Putin had some kind of dirt on him, speculation that has never been verified.

Trump was impeached the first time for pressuring Ukraine to investigate Biden ahead of the 2020 election while withholding military aid.

His tenure overlapped with a corresponding change in public opinion. Gallup found the percentage of Republicans who called Russia a friend or ally rose sharply during Trump’s presidency, increasing from 22% in 2014 to 40% in 2018. Democrats' views of the relationship remained largely the same.

Today, there is little support among Americans for a major U.S. role in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, and even less among Republicans. A new poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found only 22% of Republicans think the U.S. should play a major role in the conflict, compared with 32% of Democrats.

Republicans were also somewhat less likely than Democrats to say they’re very or extremely concerned that Russia’s influence around the world poses a direct threat to the U.S.

Adam Geller, a Republican political strategist and pollster, warned that while domestic issues have generally played a more decisive role than foreign policy in recent elections, that could change.

“If there's going to be a major war in Europe, it's going to quickly rise up in the issue matrix in the minds of voters," he said.

That would spell bad news for Biden, he said, energizing both Republicans as well as independents who voted for Biden because he'd promised a return to pre-Trump normalcy.

But Douglas Brinkley, a professor of history at Rice University, said there were larger issues at play, calling it unprecedented for Republicans to be questioning the need to stand with Ukraine and, ultimately, NATO.

“It goes against generations of foreign policy making," he said. “NATO is the heart and soul of all American foreign policy."

“You undermine NATO, there is no American presence in the world,” he added. "This isn’t a squabble about foreign policy."