Foreign Policy Blogs

Defense & Security

On the Nuclear Posture Review

On the Nuclear Posture Review

Another day, another crisis. North Korea, despite the international community’s cautious optimism following the Trump-Kim summit, appears to be moving full steam ahead with its missile program, all while the last vestige of the Iranian Nuclear Deal is swept away by hawkish White House advisors calling for regime change. It has become alarmingly clear that, […]

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Trump vs Kim: The Art of the Nuclear Deal

Trump vs Kim: The Art of the Nuclear Deal

The US and North Korea are likely to attempt diplomacy for a few months, but impossible expectations and intentionally vague promises could frustrate both sides. If this causes the deal to fall through, bilateral tensions could boil over once again. On 29 April 2018, the world watched as North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and […]

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Hire Powers: Cybercrime-as-a-Service and Terrorism

Hire Powers: Cybercrime-as-a-Service and Terrorism

Cybercrime-as-a-Service opens up a realm of worrying new possibilities for opportunistic individuals and ideologically motivated groups, as well as a new front for law enforcement and security services to secure. As early as 2013, cybersecurity experts noted that Cybercrime-as-a-Service (CaaS) was a burgeoning business. It is an industry as straightforward as it sounds – professional cybercriminals […]

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Foreign Policy of the Russian People

Foreign Policy of the Russian People

The end of the Second World War in Europe defined Soviet citizens and the Russian people in the 20th Century as those that saved the world from fascism. Despite the negative press during the Cold War in the West on Russia’s contribution to the end of Nazism, it is likely the case that every Russian […]

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Unforced Errors: On the Iran Nuclear Deal

Unforced Errors: On the Iran Nuclear Deal

Withdrawing from the Iran deal puts the United States in a weaker position in every way. Following the 2016 election, some wondered if President Trump was some sort of strategic savant, playing a game of three-dimensional chess behind a façade of emotionally volatile ignorance. Trump quickly put this theory to bed, though, and his decision […]

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Intelligence Squared U.S. Debates – The proposition “Negotiations Can Denuclearize North Korea”

  Presented by Intelligence Squared U.S. in partnership with Georgetown University live at the first Georgetown University Women’s Forum

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Missile Diplomacy in Syria

Missile Diplomacy in Syria

Syria has been the subject of international attention this week due to the recent strike by US, UK and French forces on chemical facilities operated by Syrian President Assad’s forces. Russia, Syria’s ally on the UN Security Council, has put out several statements condemning actions by Western forces, including hinting at an upgrade of Syria’s […]

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Russia’s ‘Invincible’ New Hypersonic Weapons

Russia’s ‘Invincible’ New Hypersonic Weapons

Russia had a bigly moment recently when announcing their new invincible weapons systems that use new nuclear propulsion systems and travel at hypersonic speeds. The claim that these weapons are unable to be intercepted by modern air defense systems could likely be true. Beyond the testing of American THAAD interceptor systems, there are no extremely […]

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Saudi Arabia and the UAE Heat Up Their Arms Race with Iran

Saudi Arabia and the UAE Heat Up Their Arms Race with Iran

While the world’s attention remains focused on the nuclear brinkmanship and missile launches on the Korean peninsula, the Middle Eastern arms race, pitting Saudi Arabia and its ally the United Arab Emirates against Iran has been slowly heating up and could soon reach a boiling point. The spending boom among the gulf states, the Saudis […]

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North Korea, Iran, and the Nuclear Posture Review

North Korea, Iran, and the Nuclear Posture Review

Recently, the Trump Administration decided against nominating Victor D. Cha as Ambassador to South Korea due to his opposition to the “bloody nose” strategy against North Korea advocated by the White House. On the heels of this report, U.S. disarmament ambassador Robert Wood declared that North Korea stands only months away from the ability to […]

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Australia’s role in drone strikes – connecting the dots

Australia’s role in drone strikes – connecting the dots

Joint Defence Facility Pine Gap, or “the base” as its known by locals of the surrounding township of Alice Springs in central Australia, was established in the late 1960s as a key site for US intelligence gathering. The largest part of its operations is to serve as a signals intelligence ground station for satellites in […]

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North Korea, Trump, and Underlying Dynamics

North Korea, Trump, and Underlying Dynamics

President Donald J. Trump’s tweets are striking and unhelpful, but they do not explain the essence of the current strategic situation surrounding North Korea. The underlying dynamics are more deeply rooted than any one day’s headline, even if the current U.S. president has done more than his share to exacerbate the situation. In terms of […]

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Lessons from the Cold War in Alternative Media

Lessons from the Cold War in Alternative Media

One of the most iconic tools for bringing down the Soviet Union was the distribution of information from the West and the promotion of an anti-Soviet narrative that was forbidden behind the Iron Curtain. In societies where the control of information was a necessity to controlling the narrative and beliefs of a society, challenging the […]

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The Next Chapter to Endless Conflict

The Next Chapter to Endless Conflict

The Economist published a piece this week on the actions by Iraqi forces against Kurdish interests in the Kurdish region of Iraq after a referendum for independence from Iraq took place recently. With dwindling ISIS control of territory in Iraq and Syria, the interests of those who have allied themselves with Iran, Saudi interests and […]

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What If the UN Banned the Bomb and No One Noticed?

What If the UN Banned the Bomb and No One Noticed?

Based on the amount of news coverage, you may not have heard of it, but on July 7, 2017, the United Nations adopted the Nuclear Prohibition Treaty. The agreement bans the use of nuclear weapons, and the threat of their use, as well as their testing, development, possession, sharing, and stationing in other countries. The […]

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