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Welcome to The Adversarial. Every other week, we’ll provide you with expert analysis on America’s greatest challengers: China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, and jihadists. Read more below.***RussiaA phone call between Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio last week failed to advance preparations for the planned Budapest summit between Washington and Moscow, which U.S. President Donald Trump later cancelled. According to the White House, there are “no plans … in the immediate future” for Trump to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Washington ruled out supplying Tomahawk cruise missiles, which could strike deep into Russian territory, to Ukraine. At the same time, the Wall Street Journal reported that the administration may have lifted restrictions on Ukraine’s use of some long-range, Western-supplied missiles — though Trump denied any U.S. approval of such strikes. Nonetheless, Putin threatened a “very serious” response to Ukrainian strikes deep into Russian territory.Amid stalled diplomacy on Ukraine, Washington introduced its first sanctions under the new administration, directly targeting Russia’s energy giants Rosneft and Lukoil, which together produce roughly half of Russia’s crude oil. The measures aim to cut off Moscow’s key revenue streams, though much will depend on whether the United States imposes secondary sanctions on buyers of Russian oil. Concerns about sanctions have already prompted some purchasers to reconsider sourcing from Russia. Notably, many Indian refiners, while continuing limited non-sanctioned imports, paused new contracts.In coordination with the United States, the European Union’s 19th sanctions package also targeted Rosneft and Lukoil, banned Russian liquefied natural gas imports, and blacklisted vessels from Russia’s “shadow fleet,” among other restrictions. However, the European Union again postponed the decision on whether to use frozen Russian assets as a loan to Ukraine.A Rosneft gas station in Stary Oskol, Russia, in 2019. Image: Wikimedia Commons.ChinaThe fourth plenary session of the Chinese Communist Party Central Committee was convened in Beijing