Defense & Security Archive

Three years after war broke out between Georgia and Russia on August 8, 2008, both countries still glare angrily at each other.

An analysis released this week by the computer security firm McAfee (.pdf) exposed the widespread hacking of more than 70 corporations and government organizations worldwide. McAfee did not identify the hackers, saying only that evidence pointed to a nation-state as having carried out the attacks. However, some experts were quick to point to China as the most likely culprit. While he believes that may be an accurate assessment, Chris Bronk, a World Politics Review contributor and fellow in information technology policy at the James A. Baker Institute for Public Policy at Rice University in Houston, says “the hardest thing on […]

UK officials reveal the country’s biggest ever drugs haul on Wednesday. A pleasure boat was hiding 1.2 tons of cocaine with a value of more than 493 million U.S. dollars.

The new debt ceiling deal between President Barack Obama and congressional Republicans included one major Republican concession: deep cuts in defense. The first set of defense budget cuts will amount to $350 billion over 10 years, but the deal includes a triggering mechanism that may tack on another $500 billion or so in the same time period. After a decade of war and more than a decade of sustained defense budget growth, this would represent a major shift in how the United States spends money on its military. In one sense, the decision to cut the defense budget makes a […]

Recent violence in the China’s western Xinjiang province has resulted in more than a dozen deaths and prompted an aggressive security response by Chinese authorities, who assert the unrest is being driven by Muslim separatists trained in Pakistan. The accusation, leaked to China’s state media Monday, came as the head of Pakistani intelligence was making a visit to Beijing and exposed a potential sticking-point in the oft-celebrated alliance between the two countries. According to Kerry Brown, who heads the Asia program at Chatham House in London, it also shed light on the delicate balance that characterizes the three-way relationship between […]

Libyan state television has broadcast a defiant message from Colonel Gadhafi’s son, at a time when the conflict shows signs of getting mired in stalemate.

Although China did not launch its first aircraft carrier in time for yesterday’s People’s Liberation Army Day, expectations are that a Chinese flat-top will soon appear on the high seas. Chinese media have been hinting for years that the PLA Navy would not go forever without such an important naval asset, and the past few days have seen extensive coverage of the Varyag, which when it is launched will be the country’s first carrier ship. In 1998, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) purchased the Varyag, an uncompleted Soviet-era sloped-deck carrier, for $20 million. The Chinese buyer claimed it would […]

Allegations of Russian involvement in a bombing targeting the U.S. embassy compound in Tbilisi, Georgia, have sent diplomatic shockwaves through international policy circles and threaten the Obama administration’s carefully calibrated “reset” program with Moscow. While the details of the incident underscore the Caucasus’ still-smoldering volatility, they are consistent with Russia’s longtime activities in the region. The reactions were quick and vigorous following Eli Lake’s July 22 report in the Washington Times, in which official Georgian sources accused Russian agents of complicity in a September 2010 explosion near the American Embassy in Tbilisi. According to the Georgian Interior Ministry, an Abkhazia-based […]

Police in Mexico have nabbed the boss of a drug cartel’s armed wing in Ciudad Juarez. Nicknamed ‘El Diego’, the head hit-man is linked to many deaths in Mexico’s ongoing bloody drug war.

Shelling by Syrian tanks in the city of Hama has seen scores of anti-government protesters killed.

Friday’s mass resignation by Turkey’s top general, Isik Kosaner, and the commanders of the country’s army, navy and air force was a clear sign that the long-running battle between the military and the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) has been decisively won by the government and Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. But the neutralization of the Turkish military as a political force will also bring with it greater pressure on the increasingly powerful AKP, which must now demonstrate that it can continue Turkey’s democratization process — particularly the drafting of a new, civilian-minded constitution — in an inclusive manner. […]

Despite the rush right now to declare important milestones or turning points in the fight against terrorism, the best handle we can get on the situation seems to be that al-Qaida is near dead, but its franchises have quite a bit of life in them. The implied situational uncertainty is to be expected following Osama Bin Laden’s assassination, as he was our familiar “handle” on the issue for more than a decade. But although it is normal that we now seek a new, widely accepted paradigm, it is also misguided: In global terms we are, for lack of a better […]