The United States should have a vested interest in directly engaging with this constituency—both to discredit official regime propaganda, which still depicts America as an enemy of the Iranian people, and to lay out its vision for a different, more prosperous Iranian future.
There is no question that many European countries badly — very badly — need to restore their force structures and defense industries. However, they now need to do so within a time frame shorter than it would take to establish an EU-wide procurement system and czar, let alone to alter the bloc’s funding priorities.
Houthis have a lot to gain and little to lose from their maritime operations, which they have depicted as a response to the ongoing Israeli offensive in the Gaza Strip.
Whether Washington and the West stand by Israel or raise the pressure on it to back off in Gaza may go a long way toward shaping Hezbollah’s next move.
Russia’s aggression against Ukraine, and its efforts to erase Ukrainian identity, have found a willing accomplice: the government of Putin’s close ally, Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko.
The agency’s latest report provides no clear options for the administration to assume leadership on an issue that will help shape the future of space.
Iran is destabilizing the region and upending the global order. Washington and its allies must focus on developing a comprehensive plan of action.
US policymakers are actively discussing a Black Sea strategy, reflecting its importance to American interests in the wider region.
Administration officials, including President Biden himself, have been adamant that they do not want war with Iran. Nevertheless, truly resetting American deterrence might require taking steps that could risk a direct confrontation between the United States and the Islamic Republic.
Contrary to what the Biden administration might hope, it's not really in Beijing's interest to rein in Tehran or its proxies. To the contrary, the Islamic Republic's increasingly aggressive regional profile is deeply beneficial to the PRC.
Regardless of what one thinks of the Israeli premier, a Palestinian state would not wish to live “side-by-side in peace” with the Jewish state.
Biden's deputies and political advisers consider TikTok a crucial tool for messaging and get-out-the-vote efforts in the general election. But it’s a cost the president should be willing to pay.
Years of corruption and misrule have profoundly discredited Abbas and his cronies among the Palestinian people. Meanwhile, international support (including from the U.S.) has perpetuated a malignant status quo and laid the groundwork for the profound polarization, and radicalization, of Palestinian politics.
Storm clouds are gathering on Israel's northern border.
This week’s spectacle in The Hague is part of a larger international picture, marked by an obsession with the Jewish state.
In the last week, a series of moves between Israel and Lebanese-based terrorist group Hezbollah have raised the question of whether escalation toward general war has begun.
To sustain continued Western support, Kyiv needs to showcase its anti-corruption efforts, reject Chinese investment, and broaden the policy conversation.
Since 2020, Western officials have largely shifted their focus to tackling other Chinese tech threats — TikTok, semiconductors and artificial intelligence among them. Meanwhile, Huawei has quietly enjoyed a resurgence across several product lines.
Nearly two years into its war against Ukraine, the Kremlin gives no signs it is prepared to give up on its campaign of conquest.
Wars have a way of clarifying a great many things, and of reshuffling existing partnerships in profound ways. This is what's happening with Israel's views of China and Russia, which are now undergoing a redefinition because of its current conflict with terrorist organization Hamas.
With Israel and Hamas still vowing to destroy one another, and with full combat resuming after a tenuous truce, Washington says it doesn’t want to do anything to provoke Iran into a wider regional conflict.
Kenya has a longstanding reputation as a stable democracy, but recent violent protests have drawn concern from other African states, and from the international community.
Behind the lofty rhetoric lies a sobering question: Does the White House truly want Ukraine to win? The answer is less clear-cut than it appears.
Israel is facing all-too-predictable global pressure to scale back its military operation in Gaza to spare innocent lives and prevent a regional conflict that could draw in Iran, the United States, and other nations.
Israel shouldn't wait to invade Gaza City.
Ever since the Hamas terrorist group carried out its savage campaign against Israel nearly two weeks ago, countless observers have nervously watched the start of what, as of this writing, stands as a real risk of spiraling into a regional war.
With its roots in Russian imperialism, the concept of Eurasianism isn't as benign as many believe.
Major recent shifts, starting with the Taliban victory in Afghanistan and Russia’s war in Ukraine have led to a resurgence of the Trans-Caspian transportation corridor. This corridor, envisioned in the 1990s, has been slow to come to fruition, but has now suddenly found much-needed support. The obstacles to a rapid expansion of the corridor’s capacity are nevertheless considerable, given the underinvestment in its capacity over many years.
Unlike its previous encounters with Israel, Hamas may have unleashed an unlimited war that would culminate in the group’s utter destruction.
A massive foreign policy scandal recently shook official Washington when two news outlets, Semafor and Iran International, revealed the sordid details of a long-running—and extensive—Iranian influence operation.
At this inflection point, with Congress having excluded aid to Ukraine from the funding bill keeping the government running, the time seems right for President Biden to make a high-profile speech that outlines America’s stakes in Ukraine and addresses the “America First” arguments against them.
A bevy of headlines in just the last few weeks concerning Chinese spying should force the West to bolster its China-focused counterintelligence efforts.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this week signaled a partial reversal of his coalition’s plan that would threaten the nation’s democratic character by letting the Knesset override judicial decisions, calling the effort a “mistake.”
For more than 30 years, the Department of Defense (DOD) has focused on "warfighting," emphasizing violent combat at the tactical and theater level over other national defense concerns, especially strategically.
Ukrainians are dying today because the Biden administration, paralyzed by the Burns-Sullivan philosophy of appeasement, refuses to act. Is it not high time for Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy to do his job and bring Burns and Sullivan under oath to account for their private and secretive talks with Putin?
Perhaps Israeli concessions to Palestinians are a price that Jerusalem must pay for Israeli-Saudi normalization. But don’t expect Israeli-Palestinian negotiations to produce an actual two-state solution any time soon.
The Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has just launched a study called LunA-10 to explore infrastructure needs for a future lunar economy. The aim is to kick-start an economy on the Moon in the next 10 years.
Africa undeniably represents a major strategic prize... Russia’s extensive investments – especially in light of its ongoing war in Ukraine – reflect a recognition of this reality. Yet how its African profile evolves in the years ahead will depend a great deal on its ability to continue to build ties with, and quell doubts in, regional capitals on the continent.
Ever since it launched its "special military operation" against Kyiv last year, global publics have wondered just how long Moscow can keep up its war of aggression.
“[T]he basis of [U.S.] support” for Israel, longtime U.S. diplomat and Israel watcher Dennis Ross wrote back in 2015, “is driven by the perception of Israel as a country that shares America’s values... The last thing Israel needs now is to have its basic democratic character called into question.”
Russia’s plan, clearly, is to raise the specter of food shortages (and political instability) as a way to turn world opinion against Ukraine, and to force Western nations to scale back their own campaign of pressure.
Last year, more than a million people left Russia, marking what is likely the largest yearly emigration in recorded history... There are real and tangible threats which require sustained attention from the national security apparats of countries that are hosting Russian migrants now or will do so in the future.
With NATO’s latest gathering this week in Vilnius, Washington is understandably focused on what the United States and its allies should do next to help Ukraine rebuff Russia. Moscow’s invasion, however, is part of a larger, multi-nation challenge to which Washington has not yet developed a comprehensive response.
That challenge is the axis of deepening diplomatic, military, and economic cooperation between China, Russia, and Iran. Washington is responding to individual provocations in ways that seem to contradict one another.
[T]he long-term consequences of Prighozin’s power play are liable to be profound. Here are a trio of what could be the most consequential for Russian foreign policy — and for Western nations now marshalling a response to its aggression, both in Europe and beyond.
These are heady days for Turkey's president. Last month, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the country's larger-than-life strongman, eked out an electoral win over opposition rival Kemal Kilicdaroglu to secure a third five-year term in office. In the process, he dashed the hopes of many in the West for a more democratic turn on the part of NATO's only Middle Eastern member.
Central Asians have no intention to roll back their ties with their large neighbors, but seek rather to balance them with ties with the West... America now has before it what may be the last, best chance to prevent the region from being dominated by autocratic outsiders.
With Washington resuming indirect talks with Tehran over its nuclear program, opponents of the 2015 nuclear deal in the United States and abroad are raising legitimate fears that Washington will provide the Islamic Republic with sanctions relief while getting little, if anything, in return. And who can blame them?
How can Delhi continue to grow in a changing global environment? The answer is closer partnership with Washington.
In his efforts to revive a Russian empire, Mr. Putin may have decisively doomed his country’s chances of ever being one again. For that, Russia’s president has no one but himself to blame.