Finally, and perhaps ultimately what may prove most decisive of these factors, the notorious Great Game—in which outside powers have intervened in and jousted over Afghanistan for a century and a half—is proving surprisingly propitious in terms of a rare coinciding of the interests of these countries. Read Here – The National Interest
Are America and Pakistan finally breaking up? The short answer is no. As much as both states are fed up with each other, they remain far too co-dependent to simply walk away. What we are seeing instead is a tough and protracted re-negotiation over the terms of the relationship. The question of Pakistan’s role in Afghanistan is not necessarily […]
Westerners make much of China’s obsession with “winning without fighting.” As though any sane statesman, Eastern or Western, relishes losing or longs to take up arms with all the dangers, hardships and perverse turnabouts of fortune that come with combat. Winning without fighting is what we call “diplomacy,” and it is a mode of interaction […]
After becoming prime minister, Imran Khan received a goodwill message from the president of Afghanistan, Ashraf Ghani. It read like a routine gesture, but both Kabul and Islamabad have reached a point in their deadlocked relationship where they want “real peace”, that is, for the Taliban to end their aggression. Read Here – The Indian Express
After a months-long stretch of merely sporadic violence and simmering tensions, the Middle East seems on the verge of another fiery eruption, and there are no outside powers with the interest or leverage to douse the flames. Read Here – Slate
Expatriates and professional agitators have always taken advantage of America’s relative openness to influence the public debate here. George Washington worried about French and British agents trying to draw the new nation into Europe’s wars. Similarly, the fact that foreign money flows to American think tanks and publications is hardly breaking news . Still, the brazenness of […]
For years, the U.S.-led peace process has focussed its energies on the roughly 40 percent of the West Bank in which the PA operates, while basically ignoring Gaza and East Jerusalem—the former because it was ruled by Hamas, an officially designated foreign terrorist organisation, and the latter because of its sensitivity to Israel. In the meantime, both […]
China has insisted that it will not succumb to US pressure to change its industrial policy nor offer major concessions on the bilateral trade deficit. A Chinese government official close to the high-level trade talks with America said that Washington should not set any preconditions for negotiations, adding that China had sufficient strength to fight to […]
As the modern Israeli state celebrates 70 years, the prevailing sentiment is one of extraordinary accomplishment. American Jewish leaders were incensed in 1948 when Ben-Gurion came to the U.S. and spoke about the fledgling state as the new center of the Jewish world; today, that status is nowhere in doubt. Read Here – Bloomberg View
4,500 U.S. troops died in Iraq, and countless more returned home with physical and psychological wounds they—and we, as a society—will deal with for the rest of their lives. As a nation, we have sunk over one trillion dollars into Iraq so far— one trillion dollars you see missing every day in unpaved roads, underpaid teachers, and […]
looking beyond borders 