The People's Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF), formerly the Second Artillery Corps, has a modern up-and-running missile storage facility barely 250 km from the Ladakh capital.
The Taliban say they are ready for talks with Afghanistan’s political leadership after the Muslim holiday of Eid ul Adha at the end of July, offering to hand over the last of the government prisoners in a week’s time, providing the government frees the last of its Taliban prisoners. 
We’ll probably never know exactly what sorts of documents were incinerated at China’s Consulate in Houston in the days before the United States forced it to close on Friday, after accusing it of being a hub of espionage. We may also never know what caused this month’s catastrophic fire aboard the U.S.S. Bonhomme Richard, a massive amphibious assault ship that was being fitted out to double as a small aircraft carrier, in the port of San Diego.
On June 29, four members of the Majeed Brigade, a faction of the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), launched an attack on the Pakistan Stock Exchange building in Karachi, Sindh province, resulting in 10 fatalities. The Majeed Brigade was founded in 2011 and is an elite unit within the BLA, with a modus operandi that regularly features suicide attacks. That an attack was carried out on the Karachi stock exchange is significant, given its high profile and location in the city’s central corporate district, which headquarters several multinational corporations. Early analysis indicates, however, that the militants were ultimately unsuccessful in their attempt to establish a days-long siege in the building – with the total operation reportedly lasting less than an hour.
For years, the term “China’s rise” has provided a useful shorthand for conveying the arc of China’s recent history: its ascent from poor and powerless victim to wealthy, formidable, and proud global power; from bit player on the world stage to one of the more prominent lead actors.
Xinjiang (Uyghur: شىنجاڭ, SASM/GNC: Xinjang; Chinese: 新疆; pinyin: Xīnjiāng; alternately romanized as Sinkiang), officially the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region[8] (XUAR), is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China, located in the northwest of the country. Being the largest province-level division of China and the 8th largest country subdivision in the world, Xinjiang spans over 1.6 million km2 (640,000 square miles).[1] The Aksai Chin region, administered by China mostly as part of Xinjiang's Hotan Prefecture, is claimed by India. Xinjiang borders the countries of Mongolia (Bayan-Olgii, Khovd and Govi-Altai Provinces), Russia (Altai Republic), Kazakhstan (East Kazakhstan and Almaty Provinces), Kyrgyzstan (Issyk Kul, Naryn and Osh Regions), Tajikistan (Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Region), and Afghanistan (Badakhshan). The rugged Karakoram, Kunlun and Tian Shan mountain ranges occupy much of Xinjiang's borders, as well as its western and southern regions. Xinjiang also borders the Tibet Autonomous Region and the provinces of Gansu and Qinghai. The most well-known route of the historical Silk Road ran through the territory from the east to its northwestern border.
The Pacific region is becoming a pawn in the game of power politics among traditional and regional powers over recent years. The assertive and bold Chinese behaviour in the region has triggered the US to make a strong comeback to its backyard waters. Regional powers such as Australia, New Zealand and Japan bandwagon with the US to curtail Chinese expansionism and threatening power posturing in the Blue Pacific in general and South China Sea (SCS) region in particular. China on the other hand has exploited the isolationist foreign policy adopted by the inward-looking US president Trump to expand its global reach as quickly and effectively as possible, especially during the spread of COVID-19. The outbreak of COVID-19, originating in China and causing a global pandemic, has brought the world to its knees with no signs of abating in sight. Nevertheless, the outbreak has created an opportune moment for the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to flex its military muscles and expand its maritime reach particularly in the SCS and ‘harass’ its neighbours with Taiwan being particularly targeted. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) sunk a Vietnamese fishing trawler in March. Also in March, Beijing conducted military exercises in the SCS.
Iran is reportedly in the final stages of agreeing to a $400 billion economic and security deal with China, which includes infrastructure investment, discounted Iranian oil and enhanced cooperation on both defense and intelligence. Iran, suffering from the horrific impact of COVID-19 and with its economy in free fall since the Trump administration reimposed sanctions after withdrawing from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in 2018, is in desperate economic straits.
What’s the dumbest idea affecting the foreign policy of major powers? There are plenty of candidates—the domino theory; the myth of the short, cheap war; the belief that a particular deity is “on the side” of one nation and will guarantee its success; etc. But right up there with those worthy contenders is a country’s belief that it has found the magic formula for political, economic, social, and international success and that it has the right, the responsibility, and the ability to spread this gospel far and wide.
For two years, the United States has been engaged in a global confrontation with China, based on the Trump administration’s assessment that the policy of engagement pursued for decades has failed; that the growing assertiveness of China’s authoritarian regime is driving a policy disrespectful of international law, with revisionist designs for the international order; and that China’s government is coercive both toward its own population as well as countries daring to oppose or criticize its policy, like Australia is experiencing today.
2020 hasn't been kind to the energy sector, and a growing wave of energy bankruptcies has started to build. After a difficult year marred by rising geopolitical tensions in the Middle East and crude prices in the $50-60 per barrel range, analysts warned that the energy sector needed a strong recovery to offset a rising (and expiring) mountain of debt.
The bulk of European leaders hope that in four months time Joe Biden will be victorious in the next American presidential election, given the unilateralist and isolationist foreign policy pursued under Donald Trump. Transatlantic relations have been strained on numerous occasions by the current American leader’s reluctance to place NATO at the centre of American foreign policy. This has recently been demonstrated by Donald Trump’s withdrawal from the Open Skies Treaty and his decision to pull 9500 American troops from Germany. With the very foundations of transatlanticism undermined by Trump, Europeans, notably the European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and French President Emmanuel Macron, are calling on their European allies to deepen European defence integration in the face of growing threats to Europe’s external and internal security. Heightened geopolitical competition in the Eastern Mediterranean and North Africa, including the growing risk of the resurgence of jihadist groups in the Sahel and the Levant, are part of the central argument of Paris and Brussels for securing greater European support for defence autonomy./cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/mco/RCIA4MEOCRHLNARQAFI3EBFUGQ.jpg)
WASHINGTON — The COVID-19 pandemic is evidence that Russia and China have accelerated adoption of their age-old influence and disinformation tactics to the modern era, national security experts and military leaders said.
After two decades of focusing on counterinsurgency and counterterrorism, the US Department of Defense has worked to reorient toward the possibility of conflict with a near-peer competitor. While the department has progressed in this area, one sub-set of preparation has been largely ignored: the defense enterprise needs to confront the non-zero possibility that it may have to fight not only a conventional war, but a protracted conventional war against another great power in the coming decades. To that end, the Department of Defense needs to revisit and question assumptions that it may still maintain about protracted warfare in order to prepare the United States for the potential of extended conflict with a near-peer adversary.
Agencies throughout the Defense Department are investing in biotechnologies and working initiatives to harness nature’s processes to better support warfighters.