Why Was FDI Growth Abysmally Low In India, Despite Attaining Higher Growth In The Economy? – Analysis

Subrata Majumder

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An introspection of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) flow in India reveals that FDI fell on the lowest ebb in 2023-24 within 5 years. This is despite the fact that country achieved one of the highest growth in the economy. It dropped to US$ 44,423 million in 2023-24, from US $ 59,636 million in 2020-21. This is in contrast to a spur in GDP growth, viz, 9.4 percent in 2021-22, 6.7 percent in 2022-23 and 7.2 percent in 2023-24.

The anomaly between FDI growth and GDP has raised eyebrows. This highlighted that developing nations like India, who are dependent on FDI for economic development, became vulnerable to global investment flows.

India is under utter disappointment and despair, as to why FDI did not align with the growth in the economy, despite being wooed by factors, like rising resilience to the global oil shock after shifting to Russian oil, overcoming the COVID 19 epidemic and enlarging the domestic market due to spur in GDP growth and demographic advantages.

What Does the Chinese Public Think of the China-India Border Patrol Deal?

Hemant Adlakha

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On October 21, the governments of India and China announced that their four-year military stand-off at their disputed border along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Ladakh has ended. New Delhi claimed the agreement on patrolling and disengagement along the LAC was designed to lead to “disengagement and a resolution of the issues that had arisen in these areas in 2020.” In Beijing, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson has confirmed that China and India had been in “close communication” and that both sides have arrived at “a resolution on the relevant matter, which China views favorably.”

In June 2020, Indian and Chinese troops clashed in the Galwan River Valley along the LAC in eastern Ladakh in the Himalayan region. In their worst fight in decades, at least 20 Indian soldiers were killed. The Chinese government denied reports in the Indian media that more than 40 Chinese soldiers had died. In 2021, the Chinese military’s official mouthpiece acknowledged four deaths, although doubts about the true death count remained. Since then, both countries have continuously deployed over 100,000 troops in testing weather conditions in the western Himalayan region along the disputed border.

Since the military standoff in Galwan, Indian and Chinese military officials at the senior level have held several rounds of deliberations to work out details of easing tensions in the region – especially troop disengagement plans leading to the withdrawal of forces from the tense area. Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar said in New Delhi on Monday that the agreement was the result of “patient and persistent diplomatic efforts.” Importantly, he said, the agreement would restore military patrol arrangements before the 2020 stand-off: “We will be able to do the patrolling which we were doing in 2020,” Jaishankar emphasized.

ISIS-K threat grows as it targets disaffected Muslims with sophisticated propaganda

Dan De Luce

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The Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan has ramped up its recruitment efforts in the past year, American officials and analysts say, rolling out a sophisticated propaganda campaign designed to persuade disaffected Muslims to carry out terrorist plots in the U.S. and other Western countries.

The recent arrest of an Afghan accused of plotting an Election Day attack in the U.S., as well as recent plots in France, Sweden and elsewhere, highlight the growing threat posed by ISIS-K, officials and counterterrorism experts say.

Seeking to rally support and recruit from a range of Muslim diaspora communities in Europe and the U.S., the group has churned out a high volume of videos and articles in more than a dozen languages, including Dari and Pashto, the two primary languages spoken in Afghanistan.

Lucas Webber, senior threat intelligence analyst at Tech Against Terrorism, a nongovernmental organization, said ISIS-K initially focused on Tajik immigrants in the West but has broadened its effort to other ethnic communities. The group is now seeking to exploit the isolation and alienation felt by Afghans and other Muslim immigrants and refugees struggling to build a life in unfamiliar, secular societies.

Safeguarding Sovereignty: Indonesia’s Response To China’s Territorial Encroachment – Analysis

Simon Hutagalung

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The recent expulsion of a Chinese Coast Guard vessel by Indonesia’s Maritime Security Agency (Bakamla) in the North Natuna Sea highlights the escalating geopolitical tensions between China and Southeast Asian nations.

The North Natuna Sea, which is abundant in resources and strategically significant, has long been a focal point of competing territorial claims. While Indonesia asserts its sovereignty over maritime areas by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) 1982, China’s aggressive manoeuvres reflect its broader territorial ambitions within the South China Sea. This essay contends that China’s infringement upon Indonesia’s territorial sovereignty not only violates international law but also necessitates a more robust Indonesian response to safeguard national interests. Indonesia must adopt a more assertive posture, utilising legal frameworks such as UNCLOS, forging diplomatic alliances, and enhancing its military presence to protect its territorial integrity.

China’s Territorial Claims and Indonesia’s Response

China’s assertion of vast portions of the South China Sea, delineated by its contentious Nine-Dash Line, has been a central point of contention with its Southeast Asian neighbours, including Indonesia. The incident on October 21, 2024, in which China Coast Guard (CCG) 5402 obstructed the seismic survey activities of Indonesia’s state-owned energy company PT East Pertamina Natuna, represents a recent escalation in this enduring tension.

Japan's Inevitable Independent Nuclear Deterrent

James Van de Velde

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Japan’s (Inevitable, But Unlikely Anytime Soon) Independent Nuclear Dissuasion Force

In response to the current unprecedented Chinese nuclear weapons moderation program[i] and North Korea’s likely attempt to acquire the miniaturization technology to mate its nuclear weapons onto its ballistic missiles and specifically to help deter China from invading Taiwan,[ii] Japan ought to seek -- not more military closeness with the United States -- but more independence. Japan should prepare to go nuclear. It the inevitable future of the United States’ inability to restrain the never-ending truculence of the now totalitarian states of China and North Korea, both of which have decided unambiguously to become global nuclear powers.

Regrettably, of course, Japan is unlikely to go nuclear anytime soon – the inevitable result of once being ruled by an authoritarian, expansionist regime but now is a mature liberal democracy that remains frozen in shame for its past, self-doubt, and global identity crisis. Japan seems still unable to internalize that it is not the country it was in the first half of the 20th century. The Japanese also cannot quite see that the internal and international nonproliferation regime it so assiduously adheres to cynically allows the worst regimes in Asia to go nuclear yet discourages those responsible governments that today adhere to limited, representative government. Still, Japan is likely to go nuclear someday if China and North Korea continue to remain the most totalitarian states in history and dominate Asia. But by that time a Japanese deterrent may make little difference in changing the course of China’s ascendancy and North Korea’s continued prison state.[iii] Becoming more independent sooner is better.

JUST IN: Space Force Studying How to Break China’s Kill Chains

Josh Luckenbaugh

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China has invested heavily in its long-range strike capabilities, and the U.S. Space Force is working to identify the vulnerabilities in China’s kill chains should conflict arise, the leader of the service’s Indo-Pacific component said Oct. 22.

China is building a robust arsenal of long-range precision strike weapons “specifically to target U.S. and allied forces” and “to deter us outside the second island chain and beyond,” Brig. Gen. Anthony Mastalir, commander of U.S. Space Forces Indo-Pacific, said during a talk at the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies.

“Those capabilities, many of them, depend on space,” Mastalir said. “If you want to project power globally — something the United States learned decades ago — space is a critical enabler. So, understanding how those kill chains are formed and how the PRC closes a kill chain to generate firepower beyond the second island chain with accuracy, with precision, with lethality, is the first step in learning how to break that kill chain, and that’s what we’re studying every day.”

Studying kill chains and the role space plays in them “really underscores the need for space superiority,” which involves not only ensuring that your own space-based capabilities are available to terrestrial warfighters but also “protecting the Joint Force from space-enabled attack,” he said.

Xi’s revamped army shows China is preparing for war

Miquel Vila

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Last week, while inspecting a brigade of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Rocket Force, President Xi Jinping urged the group in charge of China’s nuclear capabilities to boost its readiness for battle and deterrence capabilities. Although this is not the first time that Xi has exhorted the PLA to be “ready to win wars”, the CCP leader now seems set on sending a clear signal to the West.

One reason for this is that the Rocket Force suffered a series of purges of its leadership almost a year ago. A second factor is timing. Last month, China successfully tested a new intercontinental ballistic missile launched in the Pacific for the first time in decades, an important milestone for the same rocket Force that was rumoured to be filling missiles with water instead of fuel a few months ago.

Some have argued that the PLA corruption problems reported earlier this year weren't real, and that China has been playing a kind of 4D chess by disseminating information about its army's incompetence. Really, though, the PLA has deep-seated problems, but China is working to fix them.

Military challenges to Beijing’s South China Sea claims are increasing

Joe Keary

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Deployments of ships and aircraft to challenge China’s illegal claims in the South China Sea are increasing. European ships are appearing more often, while Asia-Pacific countries are increasingly conducting activities in areas that China regards as sensitive.

Several nations have claims in the South China Sea, but China’s claim is the most extensive and controversial. Beijing seeks to enforce sovereign rights and jurisdiction over all features within the nine-dash line, including the islands, rocks and atolls that make up the Paracel and Spratly Islands. China claims this territory despite a 2016 ruling that found that China’s claims had no basis in international law.

With international law doing little to curb China’s ambitions, more countries are using their militaries to challenge China’s claims. In 2024, more European navies operated in the South China Sea than previously in recent years, with Britain, France, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands all sending ships to the region. Meanwhile regional counties, such as Japan, Canada, New Zealand and Australia, stepped up their engagement, including via joint sailings with the Philippines in the South China Sea.

China’s economic stimulus isn’t enough to overcome that sinking feeling

Jeremy Mark

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As Beijing has intensified its efforts in recent weeks to overcome China’s economic slowdown, speculation has centered on the prospects for a combination of monetary easing, government spending, and investment incentives that will create a “bazooka” stimulus. But the measures announced so far to address the country’s property crisis, falling prices, hoard of local-government debt, and plummeting business and consumer confidence, look unlikely to produce a sustained rebound.

A more apt metaphor can be found in the recent satellite photograph of salvage vessels trying to refloat a Chinese submarine that sank while under construction. The reality is that the seventeen trillion dollar Chinese economy is weighed down by problems that will require much more than the current policy response.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping apparently has opted for a mid-course correction emphasizing lower interest rates, reduced regulation of the property market, stock market pump-priming, and debt swaps for local governments. Plans for a budget increase are expected toward the end of this month, but hopes are fading for the kind of spending that would jump start domestic demand. With millions of empty and unfinished apartments, high youth unemployment, falling salaries, and policies prioritizing high-tech industries over sectors that are the backbone of the economy, China is on track to muddle through. The outlook is for more of the status quo: businesses that don’t invest, consumers who won’t consume, and local governments that can’t deliver services.

Arab Advocates for Israel Speak Out on Social Media

Hillel Kuttler

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Born in Damascus to secular Muslim parents and raised in the village of Chtaura in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, Rawan Osman, 40, was on her fourth trip to Israel this year when we dined outdoors at a Jerusalem restaurant in mid-September. She plans to move here for good. In preparation, she spent two months this summer studying modern Hebrew in Jerusalem. (“I’m at Level 4,” she told me in Hebrew, during an interview otherwise conducted in English. “I attended an intensive ulpan.”)

Osman has been a vocal advocate on social media for Israel and against Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran—including launching an Instagram forum, Arabs Ask, shortly after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, massacre, to answer questions about Israel in Arabic. She’s a central figure in a new documentary, Tragic Awakening, about the plague of antisemitism. In May, while visiting Israel on an all-female European delegation, Osman addressed a parliament committee and condemned Hamas’ rape of Israeli women during the terrorist group’s invasion. “I never felt prouder,” she told me. “When I spoke at the Knesset, I officially and publicly announced my recovery from antisemitism. That day was an act of atonement for me.”

Osman is also in the process of converting to Judaism; when we met, she was wearing a gold necklace with a Star of David pendant.

It’s been a dramatic evolution for a woman reared on what she considers the brainwashing of youth to despise Israel and Jews, and who admits to having been an antisemite. Only after moving to France and then Germany, where she lives now, did Osman realize that her parents and teachers had lied to her.

The New Battle for the Middle East

Karim Sadjadpour

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There are many Middle Eastern conflicts that could reshape the global political order. But the one most likely to do so is the battle between the region’s two dominant powers: the kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Islamic Republic of Iran. Although this rivalry was once primarily viewed as an ethnic and sectarian conflict between the predominantly Sunni Arab Saudis and the Shiite Persian Iranians, the key dividing line today is ideological. The clash centers on their respective strategic visions—Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 and Iran’s Vision 1979. Each vision dictates the internal policies of its respective country, as well as how it deals with others.

Iran and Saudi Arabia are both autocratic energy titans, collectively controlling nearly a third of the world’s oil reserves and a fifth of its natural gas. Yet they are led by starkly different men with profoundly different plans. The de facto leader of Saudi Arabia, 39-year-old Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, known as MBS, wants to rapidly modernize a state long steeped in Islamist orthodoxy and move it away from its dependence on fossil fuel production. He created Vision 2030 to achieve those ends. The longtime leader of Iran, 85-year-old Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, remains dedicated to the ideological principles of Iran’s Islamist revolution. Khamenei does not call his plan Vision 1979. But the name can still aptly be applied, since his vision is all about preserving the Iranian Revolution’s ruthless commitment to theocracy.

The Post-Nasrallah Era: A Seismic Shift in Lebanon’s Politics

Kevork Yacoubian

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Lebanon is a consociational democracy, a system that Arend Lijphart defines as a power-sharing model specific to a given state or society based on ethnic, religious, or linguistic considerations. In these circumstances, a consociational democracy can help maintain stability in diverse and polarized societies through policies such as grand coalitions, mutual veto, proportionality in elections, and segmental autonomy through decentralization.

Yet in Lebanon’s case, consociationalism has plagued the political system due to sectarian tension and the inability to form consensus around policies. Within this system, a social-political and militant group, Hezbollah, grew into prominence starting in 1982. A 1985 open letter articulates the worldview of Hezbollah as an entity opposing Zionism and its supporters. Locally, it undertook an anti-sectarian stance and called for greater consensus within the state, moving away from the Maronite-dominated system. Hezbollah became a complex apparatus of numerous intertwined bodies and multilevel militant structures. Its governance was delegated to the Shura Council, which elects the Secretary-General and oversees various entities like the Executive and Jihad Councils responsible for administrative and military tasks.

The Taef Agreement that ended the civil war became the new framework upon which the consociational system of Lebanon took shape, starting in the early 1990s. Yet the document was never fully implemented as it stipulated the disarmament of all militia groups. Hezbollah argued that it was not a militia but a resistance group against Israel and kept its weapons through foreign support and intervention by Syria and Iran.

Assessing Russian Firepower Strikes in Ukraine

Benjamin Jensen and Yasir Atalan

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CSIS published an interactive dashboard that explores the daily and cumulative trends of Russian missile attacks, including the number of missiles launched, types of missiles used, and the success of Ukrainian intercepts. Explore the interactive dashboard here.

Ukraine is under siege from Russian firepower strikes and needs additional Western military aid, expanded sanctions against Moscow’s allies, intelligence support, and long-range strike authorization to defend its citizens.

From September 28, 2022, to September 1, 2024, Russia launched a total of 11,466 missiles. On average, 23.2 missiles were launched daily, with the median number of daily launches recorded at 17 missiles. This indicates that while the daily launch rate typically hovered around the mid-20s, there were numerous days with significantly higher activity. Notably, there were 17 days during the study period when missile launches exceeded 82 missiles in a single day. These high-intensity launch days correspond to specific military operations, strategic offensives, or responses to critical developments on the battlefield, reflecting moments of heightened conflict intensity.

This analysis is based on data compiled by Petro Ivaniuk. The dataset is available at Kaggle. CSIS has verified that the data aligns with the official numbers published by Ukraine’s Air Force social media accounts. The analysis in this paper covers the period from September 2022 to September 2024.

NATO Has 2 Big Problems: The Russian Military Threat and a Donald Trump Comeback

Joel Ostrow

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The Paradox of American Leadership and the Future of Europe: European leaders understand that Russia's threat is real. They also understand that what that threat amounts to depends on the United States. You can hear it in their voices, as what that future shall hold is about to become clear. The concern and even fear that the German president expressed during President Biden’s recent visit were dramatic and unprecedented.

Do not be deceived by Russia’s oft-bumbling, incompetent, and even self-destructive military strategy and battlefield tactics, a long-established Russian military tradition this time playing out in Ukraine. The nature of the Russian threat going forward will become crystal clear in just a few weeks, and the two possible futures could not be more different.

One constitutes an existential threat to the democracies and European and global security, and the ascendance of right-wing, authoritarian governments. The other sees a needle popping the balloon of right-wing extremism, and the Russian threat fading. As of this writing, it is even odds which of these alternate futures will prevail.

Near the top of Russian dictator Vladimir V. Putin’s strategy for strengthening Russia, unchanged since he rose to power in 2000, has been to destabilize the democracies and reestablish Russian influence across the North Atlantic. This remains his priority and he has achieved remarkable success in pursuing it.

3,000 North Korean troops are in Russia preparing to fight in Ukraine, South Korea says

Hyung-jin Kim 

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About 3,000 North Korean troops have been sent to Russia and they are now receiving training on drones and other equipment before being deployed to battlefields in Ukraine, South Korea’s spy chief told lawmakers Monday.

In a closed-door parliamentary committee briefing, National Intelligence Service Director Cho Tae-yong said another 1,500 North Korean troops have joined the 1,500 his agency estimated were in the country last week, according to lawmaker Park Sunwon, who attended the briefing.

Cho told lawmakers that his agency assessed that North Korea aims to deploy a total of 10,000 troops to Russia by December, Park told reporters.

Park cited Cho as saying the 3,000 North Korean soldiers sent to Russia have been split among multiple military bases and are in training. Cho told lawmakers that NIS believes they have yet to be deployed in battle, according to Park.

Speaking jointly with Park about the NIS briefing, lawmaker Lee Seong Kweun said that the NIS found that the Russian military is now teaching those North Korean soldiers how to use military equipment such as drones.

The Existence Of Israel’s Secret Stealth Drone Should Come As No Surprise

Joseph Trevithick

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The existence of a secret Israeli drone, referred to as RA-01 and used for covert missions, has emerged from an unauthorized disclosure of U.S. intelligence documents which have now been posted all over social media. Israel’s possession of at least a pocket fleet of long-range stealth drones capable of gathering intelligence and possibly conducting strikes is extremely logical to the point of it being a bit odd if they never pursued such a capability. Israel is home to an extensive and often pioneering uncrewed aviation industry and drones of this kind would be very well suited to supporting the country’s ongoing stand-off with Iran. During a major Israeli operation to strike targets in that country, they would likely play an indispensable role, as well.

Mention of RA-01 is found in classified documents from the U.S. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), the authenticity of which U.S. officials have not disputed and that first emerged online last week via a pro-Iran channel on the Telegram social network. An investigation into whether this unapproved release was the product of a hack or a leak is ongoing. The documents could still be disinformation or feature inaccurate info by design, so we cannot indepedently confirm their authenticity, but at this time, there is no indication that they are not legitimate and there are many indications that they are.

Can America keep being the world’s policeman

Yascha Mounk

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America is retreating from the world stage. The country’s senile president appears absent from the dramatic events unfolding in the Middle East. Joe Biden urged Israel not to go into Rafah; to abstain from taking on Hezbollah; and to forgo retaliatory strikes against Iran. At every stage, the Israeli government followed its own counsel and is now reportedly ignoring his administration ahead of next month’s election.

Biden’s term in office has been marked by similar haplessness elsewhere in the region. He will be remembered above all for America’s ignoble and chaotic retreat from Afghanistan, which left local contractors and translators in the lurch and allowed the Taliban to reimpose their theocracy. When the US diplomat Richard Holbrooke insisted America had a responsibility to its local allies, Biden responded: ‘Fuck that, we don’t have to worry about that.’

Biden’s support for Ukraine initially looked like a foreign policy success. But as the war drags on, and the administration remains reluctant to allow Ukraine to use their weapons for strikes inside Russia, even that success threatens to turn into failure.

The EU is falling apart

Tim Black

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‘The state must regain 100 per cent of the control over who enters and leaves.’ What makes this statement so remarkable is who said it. Because it wasn’t a Eurosceptic populist making this case for a nation’s sovereignty over its own borders. It was Poland’s prime minister, Donald Tusk.

Yes, that Donald Tusk. The died-in-the-wool Europhile and former president of the European Council. A man so enamoured by the EU’s borderless dream he damned those concerned about the 2015 migrant crisis as racists and xenophobes. A politician so committed to the passport-free promise of the EU’s Schengen area, that he has relentlessly defended it, even as it has visibly creaked under the migratory waves of the past decade.

And yet here he is now, issuing a call to take back control of Poland’s borders, pledging to wage a ‘merciless’ fight against illegal immigration. He now sounds more like the Brexiteers he once said deserved ‘a special place in hell’.

The ostensible prompt for Tusk’s rather surprising conversion to the merits of national sovereignty lies on Poland’s and the EU’s border with Belarus. Over the past three years, thousands of migrants from Belarus, the Middle East and Africa have crossed into Poland from the east and sought to claim asylum. Tusk claims that this influx is part of a ‘hybrid war’ being waged by Russia via its Belarusian ally / proxy. Belarusian border guards are said to be waving migrants through as part of an attempt to destabilise Poland and the EU. So in response, Tusk has announced ‘the temporary suspension of the right to asylum on [Polish] territory’.

Russia’s Imperial Ambitions: The Long-Term Threat to NATO

Daniel Kochis

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Russia is a Specter that Will Haunt the West for the Foreseeable Future: Once the artillery and glide bombs stop falling in Ukraine, Russia will still pose a significant threat to the West. How much of a threat depends upon how the war ends.

When the fighting stops Russia will retain a sizeable population, albeit with deep demographic issues, substantial capabilities, and most damningly, an unbridled imperial mindset.

Putin has been willing to sacrifice an appalling number of human lives and large-scale loss of equipment to continue to prosecute the war against Ukraine. Yes, the depleting of Soviet stocks and Russia’s reliance upon North Korean shells and now, soldiers to shore up its flagging military, to say nothing of its dependence on China and Iran, isn’t exactly a show of strength.

Yet, despite these weaknesses, the Russian military grinds on. Rosy projections about future Russian capacity to wage war from earlier in the full-scale war have fallen aside to more sobering recent analysis. Just this week NATO SACEUR General Christopher G. Cavoli remarked, “At the end of the war in Ukraine, no matter how it looks, the Russian army will be stronger than it is today. These forces will be on the border of our alliance. They are commanded by the same people who already see us as enemies and will later be dissatisfied with the way the war went. So we will have an opponent with real skills, a mass of troops, and clear intentions."

Germany and France lack a strategic brain on Ukraine, and here comes Trump

Karl Pfefferkorn

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German Chancellor Olaf Scholz seized on Joe Biden’s final visit to Europe last week to organise a conclave of key leaders on Ukraine. President Macron, Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Scholz met with the US President in Berlin to hammer out a durable plan of support for Kyiv, meaning one that could survive the increasingly likely return of Donald Trump. Would this be the moment Western leaders might grasp the nettle and make long-term political and military commitments to the defence of Ukraine? Would they finally unleash long range weapons against Russian targets? Agree on long-term defence financing that would allow European arms makers to ramp up production? Or perhaps even push for prompt NATO membership for Ukraine? Alas for fans of decisive action, these Western whales begat a sprat: a new loan wrapped in a vaporous statement pledging unwavering support for Kyiv.

Where was Polish PM Donald Tusk? The former President of the European Council rescued his country from the EU’s naughty step, yet somehow remained uninvited to Berlin, reportedly at the insistence of the German Chancellor. Poland is a front-line state in this conflict, hosts millions of Ukrainian refugees, serves as the major transhipment point for Western weapons, and owns the only land army in the EU that frightens the Kremlin. Tusk’s absence was at best puzzling and at worst counterproductive: Western assistance to Ukraine must literally go through Poland.

The Return of Total War : Understanding—and Preparing for—a New Era of Comprehensive Conflict

Mara Karlin

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Every age had its own kind of war, its own limiting conditions, and its own peculiar preconceptions,” the defense theorist Carl von Clausewitz wrote in the early nineteenth century. There is no doubt that Clausewitz was right. And yet it is surprisingly difficult to characterize war at any given moment in time; doing so becomes easier only with hindsight. Harder still is predicting what kind of war the future might bring. When war changes, the new shape it takes almost always comes as a surprise.

For most of the second half of the twentieth century, American strategic planners faced a fairly static challenge: a Cold War in which superpower conflict was kept on ice by nuclear deterrence, turning hot only in proxy fights that were costly but containable. The collapse of the Soviet Union brought that era to an end. In Washington during the 1990s, war became a matter of assembling coalitions to intervene in discrete conflicts when bad actors invaded their neighbors, stoked civil or ethnic violence, or massacred civilians.

After the shock of the 9/11 attacks in 2001, attention shifted to terrorist organizations, insurgents, and other nonstate groups. The resulting “war on terror” pushed thinking about state-on-state conflict onto the sidelines. War was a major feature of the post-9/11 period, of course. But it was a highly circumscribed phenomenon, often limited in scale and waged in remote locations against shadowy adversaries. For most of this century, the prospect of a major war among states was a lower priority for American military thinkers and planners, and whenever it took center stage, the context was usually a potential contest with China that would materialize only in the far-off future, if ever.

America Must Lead Negotiations to End The Ukraine War

Thomas E. Graham

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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has been tirelessly promoting his “victory plan” to Western allies and partners in recent weeks. He has made no secret of his conviction that the United States holds the keys to Ukraine’s success. Washington, however, has shown no enthusiasm for Zelensky’s plan, nor has it offered its plan for bringing Ukraine’s war with Russia to a satisfactory conclusion. This is a striking abdication of responsibility for a country that boasts of its role as a global leader.

What Explains Washington’s Reluctance?

From the very beginning of the war, the Biden administration has insisted that it is up to the Ukrainians to decide when and on what terms to talk to Moscow. They are the ones, after all, who are spilling blood to defend their homeland. Until then, the administration has pledged its support.

That position might appear to be virtuous, but it misrepresents the character of the war. The war is not simply about Ukraine’s territorial integrity and national sovereignty.

It is embedded in a larger conflict between Russia and the West about the future of the European order. Russian President Vladimir Putin made that clear well before he launched the massive invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Two months earlier, he released a draft of U.S.-Russia and NATO-Russia treaties on security guarantees for Russia, as well as other European states, in which Ukraine barely figured. His key demands were focused on neutering NATO, the key pillar of European security, which he saw as a grave threat.

The tragedy of Palestine

Brendan O'Neill

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That footage of Yahya Sinwar’s last, gasping breaths before he was justly shuffled off this mortal coil was extraordinary. Here we had the death agony of a fascist broadcast to the world. Crooked and hunched in a chair coated in dust, in a building bombed almost to nothing, he stared forlornly at his final foe: an Israeli drone. He used his one working arm – the other withered by injury – to toss a stick in the drone’s direction. It was a suitably primitive gesture from the leader of a gang of medieval militants who made the grave error of starting a war with the Jewish State. The stick did nothing, of course. Moments later, their drone having confirmed the presence of a terrorist, the IDF fired a tank shell into the ruins and the architect of the bloodiest pogrom since the Nazis was dead.

Not since the execution of Benito Mussolini by the Italian Resistance had the world been granted such a battle-side view of the death of a fascist. We have all seen the photograph of Mussolini hanging by his feet in Milan in 1945 following his summary execution by partisans and the pelting of his body with rotten vegetables by crowds of righteous, free Italians. Now we have seen the execution of the man who organised the largest slaughter of Jews in 80 years. It was less chaotic – the IDF troops who happened upon Sinwar’s hideout observed his body but did not desecrate it – but no less momentous. A little over a year since Hamas’s pogrom, justice had been served against the plotter of that racist outrage. The young Jews of the IDF had toppled the most notorious Jew-killer of our age.

Electronic warfare & AI boost demand for cybersecurity talent

Akhil George

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Till quite recently, having a robust cybersecurity solution in place used to be an afterthought. Today, fear over the weaponisation of everyday electronic devices, following the pager and walkietalkie explosions in Lebanon, and the rapid increase of AI-powered cyberattacks, cybersecurity is centre-stage. Cybersecurity solutions, and cybersecurity talent are in big demand.

Himanshu Kumar Gupta, senior director of government business & channels for India & Saarc at Trend Micro, says as smart homes become more common, the potential entry points for cybercriminals also expand. Malicious actors, he says, can exploit vulnerable consumer devices to gain access to personal data, compromise individual privacy, and even facilitate larger-scale attacks, such as Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks. Governments, he says, are beginning to recognise that compromised consumer devices could pose national security risks. “It is likely that nations will respond by introducing more stringent cybersecurity regulations for consumer devices. This trend may have several implications, including an increase in job opportunities in the cybersecurity sector, particularly for tech professionals.,” he says.

For such professionals, this shift signifies a growing demand for expertise in securing consumer technology, says Ajay Biyani, VP for Apac, India, and MEA at Securonix. “The expansion of regulations will create a need for cybersecurity engineers, ethical hackers, and compliance specialists to ensure devices meet these new guidelines. Additionally, companies will need skilled cybersecurity experts to develop secure products, perform risk assessments, and manage ongoing compliance efforts. Furthermore, there will be increased opportunities to develop security solutions for IoT, smart homes, and other interconnected environments.”

Should retired generals and admirals be organizing into partisan groups to influence the election?

Charlie Dunlap, J.D.

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Not long ago, retired general officers from opposing ends of the ideological and political spectrum separately contacted me with invitations to join other retired general and flag (admiral) officers (GFOs) who are organizing themselves into partisan groups to influence the outcome of the election by collectively endorsing a candidate of a political party. I declined and I encourage other GFOs to do so as well.

Although each of the groups claim to be nonpartisan, their rhetoric is plainly partisan as both of the GFO collectives attacked their opposite’s preferred candidate. They clearly aim to exploit the respect their military rank affords them with the public in an effort to give gravitas to their political endorsement.

I firmly believe these kinds of partisan activities by retired GFOs, even if well-intended, do a disservice to the armed forces and negatively impact our national security. They suggest that a clique of retired GFOs is scheming to impose their will on America’s body politic.

To be clear, I am not talking about civilians (including former political appointees who describe themselves as national security experts), who organize themselves into partisan political entities to endorse favored candidates.