The United States has a long history of provoking, instigating, or launching wars based on dubious, flimsy, or manufactured threats….Today, the question in Washington—and surely in Tehran, too—is whether President Trump is making moves that will provoke, instigate, or inadvertently drag the United States into a war with Iran. Read Here – The New Yorker
The wide differences and deep distrust between the two powers has been highlighted again with the latest abrupt turn in the bilateral trade negotiations. With or without a trade deal, the turbulence in economic ties, widely viewed as the ballast of China-US relations, heralds more choppy waters ahead. Read Here – South China Morning Post
Exactly one year after the Trump administration pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal, tensions between Washington and Tehran are escalating sharply amid confusion about what, exactly, the U.S. sees as its end goal. For Iran, uncertainty about what President Donald Trump wants to achieve and what he is prepared to do to get there […]
U.S. President Donald Trump has good reason to be skeptical about China’s willingness to live up to its commitments in any trade deal. Seasoned foreign business executives on the mainland know that any agreement there represents the start of a bargaining process, not the end. Nor is it uncommon for Chinese officials to unpick terms […]
Failure of the China talks would prove no one can do it, because China is fundamentally at odds with the U.S. That shift would set up a new dynamic with China: a relationship in which the hawks feel unbound to do what they deem necessary to protect the United States. Read Here – The Atlantic
The expiration of U.S. sanctions waivers for buyers of Iranian oil exemplifies how difficult it is today, even for the United States, to achieve foreign-policy goals without significant loses. Russia is in a prime position to deliver the oil removed from markets because of U.S. sanctions against Iran, which will result in development of cooperation between Moscow […]
Whereas Sino-American arms dynamics could well be attributed to traditional concerns related to interstate dynamics over unresolved flashpoints, much of the rest of the Asia-Pacific region confronts a holistic array of security concerns, especially those that are transboundary and transnational in nature – natural calamities, violent extremism and even the mundane, daily occurrences of cross-border […]
Iran is not an existential threat to the United States, but treating it as such could turn it into one. The Trump administration’s concerns about Iran are understandable, but its latest policy is unnecessary, counterproductive, and harmful to American interests. Read Here – Defense One
Can the United States and North Korea arrive at a deal—any deal—on denuclearization, normalization of relations, or at the very least a nuclear freeze? Given the holding pattern in nuclear diplomacy since the second summit between Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un in Hanoi, the prospects don’t appear particularly bright. The hold-up in the talks, however, […]
As the Indo-Pacific concept becomes a more central part of India’s foreign policy, here are five ideas for this Indo-Pacific desk to consider, all of which aim to advance the shared vision of a “free, open, and inclusive Indo-Pacific” promoted by India, the United States, Japan, and others. Read Here – The Diplomat
looking beyond borders 