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Tag Archives: Ukraine

The Russia-Ukraine conflict: lessons for Europeans

The Russia-Ukraine conflict: lessons for Europeans

The current Russian-Ukrainian conflict is a game changer for European security. The entire European security architecture has trembled as the eastern flank of the continent has been destabilized. From a European perspective, four fundamental lessons-learned can already be drawn.

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The Dangers of Investing in Conflicted Areas

The Dangers of Investing in Conflicted Areas

Investments in Colombia in the ’80s and ’90s were often limited to large multinational companies. These companies would take the risks to mine in Colombia’s regions despite the dangers present to their employees. On many occasions, Colombians and foreign nationals were kidnapped for ransom, and many international workers and influential Colombians would not survive or were […]

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The Difficulties in Handling a Melee of Policy Decisions

The Difficulties in Handling a Melee of Policy Decisions

The last three weeks in world politics has been nothing less than a complete disaster of the international community. Since the end of the 2014 World Cup, it appears that anything that President Obama would have considered to be a major issue has appeared as a crisis upon a crisis. Unfortunately, there has been mostly […]

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Insurgencies and Their Equipment: Modern Challenges on the Field of Battle

Insurgencies and Their Equipment: Modern Challenges on the Field of Battle

With the ISIS forces entering the outer region of Baghdad, the move towards Iraq’s capital lead to a lot of equipment being captured by those forces. This new and advanced equipment will likely play an important role in future battles. It is important to look at some of the tanks and artillery that might become […]

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Reassurance First: Goals for an Ambitious Weimar Triangle

Reassurance First: Goals for an Ambitious Weimar Triangle

The current crisis in Ukraine is a game changer for Europe. While it has reignited a necessary public debate about collective measures to ensure Europe’s security, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) immediate neighborhood has witnessed a considerable worsening of security conditions for some time.

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Donbass Dilemmas

Donbass Dilemmas

People have been praising the strategy of Russian president Vladimir Putin toward eastern Ukraine and the successes that it has brought him there. Yet the more I think about it, the more I wonder how much strategy there is behind his actions and whether Putin is beginning to have second thoughts about those successes. Both […]

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A Muslim Call to Partition the CAR

A Muslim Call to Partition the CAR

While the world focuses on the calls for partition by pro-Russian citizens in the south and east of Ukraine, similar calls from a small African nation are drawing less attention — despite horrific human rights abuses occurring on its territory. In what the U.N. human rights body and Amnesty International have called “ethnic-religious cleansing” between the […]

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Why Western Law Enforcement Should Target Russia’s Ruling Elite

Why Western Law Enforcement Should Target Russia’s Ruling Elite

In contrast to their strident rhetoric about Russia’s annexation of Crimea, the EU and the U.S. have imposed only limited, albeit targeted, sanctions, primarily against Russian President Vladimir Putin’s inner circle. By imposing sanctions on Bank Rossiya and Mr. Timchenko, Western leaders are sending a tacit message that some of Mr. Putin’s personal wealth kept in the West is potentially in jeopardy.

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Juurd Eijsvoogel on the Crimea crisis

Juurd Eijsvoogel on the Crimea crisis

Hosted by Sarwar Kashmeri, the Foreign Policy Association’s Great Decisions podcast series will headline issues together with the leaders whose decisions today will mold the foreign policy of tomorrow. Each podcast will tackle a different Great Decisions topic in the 2014 series, a list of which can be found here. The Great Decisions podcasts can also be found […]

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Moscow Takes Ukraine, Beijing Takes Mongolia?

Moscow Takes Ukraine, Beijing Takes Mongolia?

map: ChinaSmack Tensions escalated in eastern Ukraine on Thursday, as Ukrainian forces killed up to five pro-Moscow separatist rebels, and Russia launched army drills near the border in response, raising fears its troops would invade. The Ukrainian action took place to recapture territory from the rebels, who have seized swaths of eastern Ukraine since April […]

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Fracking, U.S. Manufacturing, and Putin’s Crimea

Fracking, U.S. Manufacturing, and Putin’s Crimea

The Russian annexation of Crimea and the continued menacing of Ukraine has given rise to a rather surprising challenge. People are calling for the United States to step up the export of domestically produced oil and, especially, natural gas in order to save Ukraine. The call is not without a logical foundation. Ukraine—a highly inefficient […]

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Confronting Confrontation: Is the Isolation of Russia the Right Strategy?

Confronting Confrontation: Is the Isolation of Russia the Right Strategy?

In a New York Times op-ed last month entitled “Confronting Putin’s Russia,” Michael McFaul, the recently retired U.S. Ambassador to Moscow, channeled frustration over tensions in Crimea into a call for “isolating” Russia. His case, though passionate, appears to rely on some questionable assumptions and prescribes a rather shortsighted approach. Taking Responsibility McFaul begins by arguing that, “a […]

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Candid Discussions: Ian Bremmer on a Disengaged U.S. Foreign Policy

Candid Discussions: Ian Bremmer on a Disengaged U.S. Foreign Policy

In a wide-ranging discussion with Reza Akhlaghi of the Foreign Policy Association, Dr. Ian Bremmer discusses what he considers to be a disengaged foreign policy by the United States. On April 10, 2014 Dr. Bremmer will be speaking at the Foreign Policy Association on the world’s biggest political risks.  Dr. Ian Bremmer is the founder and […]

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Talking about a revolution. Is shale gas the answer?

Talking about a revolution. Is shale gas the answer?

Ever since Moscow decided to up the ante and invade the Crimean peninsula, shale gas reentered journalist lingo. Many have chipped in the debate, including Speaker of the House John Boehner who has argued that American gas is the sole remedy for Russia’s dominance of the European energy market. His diagnosis was that since natural […]

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Crimea or the Future of the Liberal World Order

Crimea or the Future of the Liberal World Order

If the 20th century was about an ideological fight between market-economy versus Communism, the 21st could very much be about liberal democracy versus imperialism. This could be the very lesson of Russia’s invasion of Crimea. Power politics is – even though it has never disappeared – now a reality that the EU and the U.S. […]

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Foreign Policy Blogs is a network of global affairs blogs and a supplement to the Foreign Policy Association’s Great Decisions program. Staffed by professional contributors from the worlds of journalism, academia, business, non-profits and think tanks, the FPB network tracks global developments on Great Decisions 2014 topics, daily. The FPB network is a production of the Foreign Policy Association.