... history. As Francis Fukuyama famously noted in “The End of History,” the end of the Cold War marked the end of thousands of years of ideological struggle, and the spread of Western Democratic capitalist ideals all around the world was inevitable ... ... governments whose missions are resisting pressures of EU policy, as racial, ethnic, and religious tension, fears of Islamic terrorism, nativism, and demagogues become ever more commonplace, it is terrifying to envision its future, too. An autocratic ...
On February 18, 2016 the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC) held a meeting of experts with Dr. William J. Parker III, Chief Operating Officer at the
EastWest Institute
. Dr. Parker is a retired senior naval officer, author of numerous publications on the problems of Islamic extremism in the Middle East, and worked for US diplomatic missions in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The discussion covered the issues of building trust between Russia and the United States as the countries with the...
... alliance against their mutual enemy: Maliki’s anti-Sunni government. Using Anbar as a base within Iraq, ISIS was able to advance and take large amounts of Iraqi territory, much of which it still holds today. Thus, it was Maliki’s absolute refusal to compromise with and accommodate Iraqis Sunnis and others that created the current crisis with ISIS. The sad truth is that if Maliki had treated the Sunnis and Kurds more fairly, the Iraqi government—Shiites, Sunnis, and Kurds united against terrorism as they were back in 2007—would have been in a strong position to fend off any ISIS incursions coming into Iraq from Syria. If anything, the internal dynamics of Syria spilled over into Iraq, not the other way around, and hardly related ...
... particularly appropriate for Putin’s strategy because his methods of pursuing whatever gains he seeks pose risks that threaten to harm Russia’s interests more than those gains would help them: Russia is particularly vulnerable to Sunni extremist terrorism for a number of clear reasons and its moves in Syria, as I have written before, are only going to expose Russia to further attacks. If Russia is so concerned with 10% of its arms sales and access to a few military bases in Syria, I am certain ...
... are some sort of moral equivalent. Drones involve precision weapons, and strikes target those are terrorists or involved in terrorism. There are civilian deaths in these attacks quite often, but with no evidence to the contrary we cannot legitimately ... ... work on your similes and metaphors before inflicting your lack of erudition on others.
To the militant pro-Snowden anti-NSA crusaders: I’m not going to tell you that what Snowden did had no positive effect; it clearly did. But there are also negative ...
... Director General Andrey Kortunov received U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs James O’Brien accompanied by American diplomats accredited in Moscow.
The discussion focused on Russia-U.S. cooperation in countering international terrorism, the role of independent think tanks in restoration of the bilateral dialogue on security, as well as Syria and the Middle East.
The attacks will almost inevitably lead to an escalation of war in Iraq and Syria, as well as to changes in the balance of forces in the Middle East as a whole.
Although it will take time to truly evaluate the consequences of the November 13 massacre in Paris for the French, European and world politics, some conclusions can be made now.
The attacks will almost inevitably lead to an escalation of war in Iraq and Syria, as well as to changes in the balance of forces in the Middle East as a whole. The...
Russia and the West have almost never seen eye-to-eye on what defines terrorism
With new international Syria talks in Vienna planned for this coming weekend, the diplomatic standoff over who counts as a terrorist versus legitimate opposition in Syria will be in renewed focus. In the recent past, Russia has repeatedly ...
A Sensible Grading of Obama’s Middle East Strategy: The Syrian Civil War
Grading Obama on what has—and has not—been done by his administration regarding the Syrian Civil War
By Brian E. Frydenborg (LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter @bfry1981) August 3rd, 2015
Reuters
Originally published on LinkedIn Pulse here
Those who argue that the Obama Administration’s overall Middle East strategy is a total failure have no sense of strategy themselves and dangerously substitute tactical-here-and-nows...
... pressure to Israel beyond speeches and meetings. Even while the Obama Administration was trying shore up support for the talks, Israel announced the construction of 1,600 settlement housing units to be built on illegally occupied, disputed land in East Jerusalem (which was occupied in 1967 along with the West Bank and Gaza and which Israel has held in defiance of multiple binding resolutions of the United Nations Security Council over the decades since, beginning with the unanimously-agreed-upon Resolution ...
