January, 2022

• 6 January

  Turkey Scrambles to Salvage Its Influence in a Post-U.S. Afghanistan

  

  Like other foreign powers, Turkey was caught off-guard by the speed of the Taliban’s recent blitz across the country, which has greatly complicated Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s plans. While most NATO countries were happy to wash their hands of the conflict after a grueling 20-year counterinsurgency and nation-building effort, …

  Read More »
• 6 January

  Libya’s Expanding Proxy War May Be the Ultimate Test of NATO’s Resilience

  

  With Egypt reportedly on the brink of invading neighboring Libya, and troops from Chad said to be on their way north to join Gen. Khalifa Haftar in his fight to topple the internationally recognized government in Tripoli, what was already a complicated proxy war could soon become Africa’s first full-on …

  Read More »
• 6 January

  An Isolated Erdogan Learns the Cost of Hubris in Idlib

  

  Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan traveled to Russia on Thursday, seeking to persuade President Vladimir Putin to help stem disaster in Syria’s Idlib province. Turkish forces are locked in fierce combat there with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s army in what has become the last bastion of the armed rebels fighting …

  Read More »
• 6 January

  Escalating to Deescalate? Why Turkey Is Targeting Syria’s Army

  

  For the first time in Syria’s nine-year war, the Turkish military this week launched direct attacks on the Syrian army. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Monday that he ordered howitzers and F-16 fighter jets to hit President Bashar al-Assad’s forces near the Turkish border in response to the killing of …

  Read More »
• 6 January

  Erdogan’s Africa Diplomacy Puts Turkey’s Ambitions to the Test

  

  Last week, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan touched down in Luanda, Angola, for the first leg of a four-day, three-nation diplomatic tour of Africa. After meeting with Angolan President Joao Lourenco, the Turkish leader continued on to West Africa, where he met with his Togolese counterpart, Faure Gnassingbe, before concluding …

  Read More »
• 6 January

  Turkey’s Former Economy Czar Looks to Unseat Erdogan and the AKP

  

  In a major political shake-up in Turkey, Ali Babacan, a former economy minister and once-close confidante of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, recently ended months of speculation and formally launched a new political party to challenge his old boss. Babacan, who resigned last July from Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party, or …

  Read More »
• 6 January

  Erdogan’s Weaponization of Religion Is Losing Its Edge

  

  For more than three months, Turkey has been rocked by rolling protests centered in Istanbul. Following President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s controversial appointment of businessman Melih Bulu as the new rector of Bogazici University in January, students and professors began holding rallies to denounce the pick. They see Bulu as an …

  Read More »
• 6 January

  The Global North Is Closing Its Doors to Migration

  

  In July, British Home Secretary Priti Patel announced that the U.K. had agreed to pay France roughly $72 million to fund border personnel and equipment that would be used to stop asylum-seekers from crossing the English Channel. The deal came amid a dramatic rise in the number of channel crossings. …

  Read More »
• 6 January

  NATO-Russia Talks Set On Moscow’s Ukraine Border Troop Buildup

  

  NATO said Tuesday that Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has scheduled a meeting next week between Western ambassadors and Russian officials to try to defuse tensions over Moscow’s troop buildup along Ukraine’s eastern border with Russia. The NATO-Russia Council meeting is set for January 12 in Brussels, two days after U.S. and …

  Read More »
• 6 January

  Warfare Evolved: Drone Swarms – Analysis

  

  Unmanned systems with a variable degree of autonomy, generally known as ‘drones,’ have become commonplace in the world’s advanced militaries. In their various aerial, maritime, and ground forms, these vehicles are used to perform a wide spectrum of roles. Yet advances in new technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, …

  Read More »