Snopes And The Search For Facts In A Post-Fact World
As pretty much anyone knows, the truth can be a slippery bastard. Getting to the bottom of something requires what you might generously call a fussy personality. Read Here – Wired
Five Trade Issues The US And China Need To Tackle Before Trump Goes To Beijing
A number of concerns – ranging from exchange rates to accusations of intellectual property theft – are likely to feature prominently when Donald Trump visits Beijing later this year. Read Here – South China Morning Post
What Did India’s Surgical Strike Against Pakistan Achieve?
The surgical strikes were the first time the political leadership owned trans-LoC operations and marked a huge shift in the sanctity of the LoC as a de-facto international boundary…This could play a significant role in future Indo-Pak negotiations over Kashmir, where India starts asserting its sovereign claim over the whole of J&K, instead of accepting […]
The Long History Of North Korea’s Declarations Of War
When Ri Yong Ho, the foreign minister of North Korea, called U.S. President Donald Trump’s fiery speech at the United Nations a “declaration of war”, the phrase ricocheted across Twitter…As it turns out, though, North Korean officials refer to actions as a declarations of war roughly as often as Trump claims that CNN is fake […]
Return of The City-State
We are just as deluded that our model of living in ‘countries’ is inevitable and eternal. Yes, there are dictatorships and democracies, but the whole world is made up of nation-states. This means a blend of ‘nation’ (people with common attributes and characteristics) and ‘state’ (an organised political system with sovereignty over a defined space, […]
U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis’s India visit: 5 Key Issues To Watch Out For
The Mattis visit to India comes almost exactly a month after President Trump unveiled a new South Asia and Afghan policy on 22 August, giving India a publicly key role in stabilizing Afghanistan while censuring Pakistan for perpetuating terror camps and sustaining terrorists on its soil—also in public. Coincidentally, Mattis is to travel to Afghanistan […]
What Can India Do To Shore Up Kabul’s Military Capabilities
The question of a larger Indian role in securing Afghanistan is expected to figure prominently in the talks between the visiting US Defense Secretary James Mattis and the Indian leadership. That Washington and Delhi are talking about collaboration in Afghanistan marks an important shift in the international relations of South Asia. Read Here – The […]
The Return Of The Madman Theory
Is Donald Trump reviving the “madman theory” of diplomacy, introduced by Richard Nixon to instill fear in America’s adversaries? North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s description of Trump as “mentally deranged” suggests that such a ploy might be working – or else Kim is more right than he, or the rest of us, would like. Read […]
Facebook Marks The End Of Social Media’s Wild West
Increasingly, Facebook is finding itself in an impossible position as it tries to remain, in spirit at least, a content-agnostic platform that allows everyone to have a voice. Sometimes the company faces scrutiny when it allows certain content to remain, as in the case of fake news or neo-Nazi propaganda. Other times it faces scrutiny for […]
Merkel Lands Fourth Term, But At What Cost?
Angela Merkel will serve as Germany’s chancellor for a fourth term, but Sunday’s win comes at a high price. The right-wing populists are now the third-strongest party in parliament and her negotiations to create a new government are likely to be complicated. Read Here – Spiegel Online Also Read: Angela’s ashes: 5 takeaways from the German […]
looking beyond borders 