The Taliban has “prevailed” in its battle with the West in Afghanistan, said General Lord Dannatt, the former head of the British Army as it emerged all UK and U.S. troops will be withdrawn on Sunday. Writing in The Telegraph, General Lord Dannatt said: “Ultimately, Taliban force of arms has …
Read More »China’s nuclear deterrence buildup cannot be tied down by the US: Global Times editorial
Commenting on a report in the Washington Post about China’s nuclear capability building, US State Department spokesman Ned Price said on Thursday that the build-up of nuclear forces had become more difficult for China to hide and it appeared to be deviating from decades of nuclear strategy based on minimal …
Read More »The Centenary of the Chinese Communist Party: Looking Forwards Not Backwards
Undoubtedly, China’s communists have achieved a great deal. But the party remains nervous about its hold on power, and hesitant to implement necessary political and economic reforms. Given the inauspicious start of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) – worried about police surveillance, it moved its founding meeting from Shanghai to …
Read More »After Afghanistan Withdrawal: A Return to ‘Warlordism?’
As the United States withdraws from Afghanistan, Washington is considering options to ensure its intelligence-gathering and counterterrorism capabilities are maintained. Recent reporting suggests that United States is looking to use bases in Pakistan and in the former Soviet Republics in Central Asia — although without success so far. Washington is …
Read More »Rumsfeld-lie – Iraq, Afghanistan devastated
Former US defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld has died a few days back. The death-news pulls back the lie the US political leader uttered and sold forcefully around the world. That was not a petty lie. That was a devastating lie – creating a premise for an imperialist invasion of a …
Read More »CHINA AND RUSSIA SEEKING TO DIVIDE EU AND NATO, US DIPLOMAT SAYS
With foreign influences and the pandemic undermining democracy in the V4 and the Western Balkans, external security – delivered via NATO – is fundamental, Kurt Volker argues. After a meeting-heavy June that saw the leaders of the international community converge on several stages and fora, it appears as though China …
Read More »Pakistan: Shoring Up Afghanistan’s Peace Process
Pakistan’s stakes in Afghanistan are rising as U.S. and NATO troops prepare to leave. All-out war after the withdrawal could push more Afghan refugees across the border and strengthen Pakistani militants. Islamabad should ratchet up pressure on the Taliban to engage in peace talks. What’s new? The fast-paced withdrawal of foreign …
Read More »China’s Crucial Decade
For the past four decades, a narrative has taken hold among policymakers and the general public alike suggesting that China’s rise will continue indefinitely, even when mathematics and demographics suggest otherwise. Between the 1980s and the turn of the millennium, this notion was fueled by China’s astonishing double-digit growth. In …
Read More »To Really Compete With China, Invest in America’s Human Capital
In July 1971, one month after the publication of the Pentagon Papers and a year before the Watergate break-in that would eventually cause his downfall, Richard Nixon gave one of the most interesting, and in retrospect, important, speeches of his political career. Still relatively unblemished by scandal, Nixon was cruising …
Read More »Pentagon Will Leave Large Number of Troops in Afghanistan to Protect US Embassy, Airport
The U.S. will leave a number of troops that is much larger than a typical security detail to guard its embassy in Kabul, along with American forces at the Kabul airport to help protect the vital facility for a time, the Pentagon confirmed Tuesday. “Afghanistan is not going to be …
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