The Cuban missile crisis of October 1962 brought the world close to a nuclear war between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. But the Kennedy-Khrushchev drama eclipsed another momentous event that occurred at the same time: a border war between the world’s most populous countries, China and India. A new book by Bruce Riedel, JFK’s Forgotten […]
Since the collapse of several authoritarian regimes in the 1980s and 1990s—most notably the Soviet Union—conventional wisdom in political science has held that dictatorships inevitably democratize or stagnate. This wisdom has even been applied to China, where the Communist Party (CCP) has presided over 26 years of economic growth since violently suppressing protests at Tiananmen […]
In July 1984, U.S. customs agents arrested a Pakistani national, Nazir Ahmed Vaid, at Houston International Airport for trying to purchase krytrons–useful for triggering nuclear weapons–and smuggle them out of the United States Some months later, Vaid was found guilty of violating export control laws, but a plea bargain produced a light penalty: deportation. Months […]
After deploying its ground and air assets across Syria, Russia entered into an agreement with the Shiite leaders of Iran and Iraq to coordinate military efforts. At the podium of the United Nations, Russian President Vladimir Putin looked as if he had pulled off a masterful power play in the Middle East. But Putin seems […]
Contrary to what incompetent propagandists keep saying, it was not Gorbachev who ruined the Soviet Union, but the top of the state machinery who revolted against his democratic reforms. Boris Yeltsin’s deadly enmity played a disastrous role. Leonid Kravchuk, the former ideology chief of the Communist Party in Ukraine, made the second largest personal contribution […]
Twenty-five years after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Central Asia is a region of relative stability. There are, of course, security, economic, and social challenges, which give local leaders sleepless nights; however, the narrative shift – from a troublesome region to an area of opportunity – is producing some surprising results. Read Here – […]
U.S. foreign policy has reached a turning point, as analysts from across the political spectrum have started to dust off Cold War-era arguments and to speak of the need for a policy of containment against China. The once solid Washington consensus behind the benefits of “constructive engagement” with Beijing has fallen apart. Read Here – […]
As strategic relations go, few countries can match the enduring partnership that India and Russia have shared since the 1960s. For close to half a century Russia has been New Delhi’s foremost military supplier. In fact, defense trade became the raison d’être for strategic relations between the two nations – particularly in the post-Cold War […]
Current dialogue between Russia and the West scarcely deserves the name. Too often, it is simply a contest of postures and a recitation of grievances, each side clinging to positions stripped of nuance or scope for compromise. This is doing no one any good. For all kinds of reasons, the West needs more unsentimental Russophiles. Read Here – The Moscow Times
Rolling through Red Square to the tune of patriotic war hymns, Russia’s new battle tank, the Armata T-14, will surely steal the show on Saturday during Moscow’s blowout celebration of the 70th anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany in World War II. But despite the pomp and circumstance of its unveiling, experts said that the massive new tank, hailed by Russia’s media as one of the best […]
looking beyond borders 