Briefing Archive

Pakistan’s decision to allow a Chinese company to take over operations of the Gwadar port in Baluchistan has raised anxiety levels in South Asia. Since Jan. 31, when reports first emerged of the Pakistani Cabinet’s decision to transfer operational control of the port to China Overseas Port Holdings, India has been worried about the strategic consequences of what is being described as the establishment of a de facto Chinese outpost in the Indian Ocean. Many in India see the move as another bead in China’s “string of pearls” strategy of investing in port and infrastructure deals throughout South and Southeast […]

On India’s Navy Day in December, Indian Chief of Naval Staff D.K. Joshi declared that the Indian navy was prepared to operate in the South China Sea if called upon to do so. The government subsequently downplayed Joshi’s remarks, but the fact remains that the South China Sea has emerged as a vital sea corridor for India, with more than half the country’s trade currently passing through it. The security of the South China Sea will grow even more important to New Delhi in the years to come as India looks to link itself to East Asian supply chains and […]

It was months in the making, persistently delayed and then twice rescheduled. But when British Prime Minister David Cameron’s speech on the future of the U.K.’s relationship with the European Union finally arrived late last month, at least it did not lack ambition. Cameron hopes to renegotiate Britain’s relationship with the EU and push forward a process of reform for the whole union. His aim is to secure a looser relationship with a streamlined Europe, one that all but the more strident europhobes in his party and the public would prefer to full departure from the bloc. Should the Conservatives […]

For roughly a decade now, I’ve been advocating that America needs to be unsentimental in choosing its military allies for the 21st century. Europe and Japan are aging and seem increasingly less willing to protect their interests abroad, while India and China are becoming budding superpowers with global interests that, to a stunning degree, overlap with America’s. Most pointedly, we live in an age of “frontier integration” triggered by globalization’s rapid advance, a process in which China and India, and not the “old” West, are the two rising pillars. So it makes sense for America to focus future alliance-building efforts […]

A little more than a decade ago, in July 2002, the African Union (AU) was formed against an inauspicious backdrop. For Africa, the previous decade had been defined by conflict, state collapse, failed peacekeeping missions and even genocide. So dire had Africa’s condition become that in May 2000 the Economist captured its malaise under the infamous rubric, “the hopeless continent.” The AU’s mission over the past decade was in part to challenge and rewrite such bleak narratives. Looking back, its record is mixed, particularly in its attempts to position itself as the principal vehicle for the advancement of democratization on […]

It is the United States’ stated policy to employ an “active cyberdefense” capability to defend U.S. military networks and systems and to conduct “full-spectrum military cyberspace operations” when directed to assist in that defense. Active cyberdefense is a term of art widely understood to include offensive actions in cyberspace taken with defensive purposes in mind. Such actions are tactical operations with the limited goal of mitigating an immediate hostile act. In addition, U.S. Cyber Command, the U.S. military’s combatant command tasked with cyberoperations, is reportedly planning to create “national mission forces” that would protect the computer systems undergirding “electrical grids, […]

Last week, a trial court in Guatemala City decided that there was enough evidence to send Efrain Rios Montt, the former Guatemalan general who headed a military dictatorship from 1982 to 1983, and Jose Rodriguez Sanchez, Rios Montt’s former head of military intelligence, to trial. Rios Montt, along with other military chiefs, is accused of masterminding a scorched earth campaign against the Ixil Mayan group in northern Guatemala that resulted in more than 1,700 deaths in 1982-1983. It is the first time a former head of state in the Americas will stand trial for genocide. While the trial in Guatemala […]

French President Francois Hollande’s Jan. 15 visit to the United Arab Emirates garnered relatively little attention, coming just four days after the start of the French military intervention in Mali. Though Hollande traveled to the UAE ostensibly to give the keynote address at the World Future Energy Summit, the trip was actually the latest move in Paris’ efforts to strengthen the two countries’ economic and strategic relationship. Over the past five years, France has made a concerted push to boost ties with the United Arab Emirates. Former President Nicolas Sarkozy visited twice, in 2008 and 2009, and established France’s first […]

In a recent visit to Southeast Asia, his first overseas trip as Japan’s new prime minister, Shinzo Abe openly baited Beijing over the disputed Senkaku Islands. In a direct reference to China, Abe declared, “Open seas are public assets, and Japan will do its utmost to protect them by cooperating with the [Association of Southeast Asian Nations].” During the three-day trip, in which he visited Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia, Abe underscored his key concern by repeatedly voicing Japan’s opposition to any changing of the “status quo by force” — especially in territorial disputes involving China and its neighbors in East […]