This second cold war, conducted on a teeming planet whose anxiety is intensified by the passions and rages of social media, is only in its beginning stages. The aim, like in the first Cold War, is negative victory: not defeating the Chinese, but waiting them out, just as we waited the Soviets out. Read Here […]
For four decades, the U.S. and Iran have been locked into what is essentially an ongoing, low-grade war. Since its inception in 1979, the Shiite theocracy, now run by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and a council of top clerics, has considered the U.S. the “Great Satan” — an intruder in the Middle East and […]
In many ways, neutrality and obscurity go hand in hand in this country of 4.9 million people. The sultanate has more or less refrained from taking sides in the ever-expanding roster of Middle Eastern conflicts since Omani Sultan Qaboos bin Said al-Said ascended the throne in 1970. Therefore, Oman has had little reason to engage […]
When Russians woke up last Wednesday morning, most had likely never heard of Mikhail Mishustin, the head of the country’s tax service. But by the time they went to bed that night, Mishustin had been named as Russia’s new prime minister after a day that included a flurry of proposed changes to the constitution and […]
The United States is trying to square a circle, remaining strong and deterring dangerous elements, but to do so for U.S. interests—interests that increasingly seem to be fewer and fewer in the Middle East. Read Here – American Greatness
The coming of 2020 marks not just a new year, but a new decade. This random artefact of an arbitrary calendar system cries out for predictions of the events and trends that will shake the world in the 2020s. But, honestly, even the next year is something of a mystery – never mind the next […]
…India is facing a chasm between its global aspirations and the reality of its national power. A confluence of disruptive factors has now made the business-as-usual approach simply unsustainable. A course correction if not undertaken and executed sensibly could imperil India’s rise for the next generation. Read Here – Economic & Political Weekly
How Asia is changing and what are the challenges for 2020 … a presidential election year in the United States and how it will change the dynamics between Washington and key Asian capitals after a bruising trade war with China that impacted the global economy. Then there are elections in Taiwan, North Korea.. and other […]
THE ECONOMIST’S first cover of 2019 compared the presidency of Donald Trump to a television series. That was apt. This year’s instalment of “The Trump Show” churned out more plot twists, sudden departures and cliffhangers than most primetime-drama writers would dare attempt in a single season. The year has culminated in a dramatic impeachment episode, in which […]
How should observers assess India’s new security order? And what implications, if any, does it have for the United States? There are three characteristics of the new order: an emphasis on risk-taking and assertiveness, the fusing of domestic and international politics, and the use of unrelenting spin to hold critics at bay. This approach carries […]
looking beyond borders 