The First Cold Warrior; Wilson Shaped a Century of U.S.-Soviet relations.(OPED)

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Byline: Matthew Fontaine, SPECIAL TO THE WASHINGTON TIMES

During the early 20th century, Imperial Russia did little to capture the attention of the United States. In 1913, Woodrow Wilson began his presidency dedicated to domestic issues. The newly empowered Wilsonians simply did not give the creaky Russian autocracy much thought. Wilson, a former governor and president of Princeton, was a novice when it came to foreign affairs in general and knew very little of Romanoff Russia in particular. He could take comfort in the fact that the top American experts were not much better.

Most, if not all, policy advisers and diplomats were themselves ignorant of the impending Russian revolution …