Defense & Security Archive

The Thai government announced today that it has agreed to conduct peace talks with one of the groups involved in Thailand’s southern insurgency, following a highly ambitious but unsuccessful raid by insurgents in the country’s south earlier this month. Jeff Moore, an expert on Thailand’s insurgencies, explained the context of the attack and the government’s previous efforts at talks in an email interview from Thailand conducted before the talks were announced. WPR: What has been the recent course of Thailand’s southern insurgency? Jeff Moore: Most recently we’ve seen a beehive of activity. Insurgents have steadily recovered from major government counterinsurgency […]

Elba Esther Gordillo, the leader of the most powerful teachers union in Mexico, was arrested earlier this week on suspicion of embezzling millions in union funds for personal expenses, including paying for private property and plastic surgery. The arrest of the Gordillo, known throughout Mexico simply as “La Maestra,” or “The Teacher” and previously seen as being above the law, came a day after Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto signed a sweeping educational reform that the union she led had opposed. Duncan Wood, director of the Mexico Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, said that while a […]

When Kenyans vote in the country’s presidential, parliamentary and county elections March 4, they will have the chance to distance themselves from the traumatic elections of December 2007. More than 1,000 people were killed and approximately half a million others fled their homes when violence between rival ethnic groups and political supporters broke out in the weeks following the vote. Much has changed since then, a lot of it for the better. But the main causes of the violence remain unaddressed. The 2013 election is thus fraught with hazard, and a mood of trepidation has characterized the campaign period. The […]

Whether the U.S. defense budget is cut through sequestration or more thoughtfully planned measures, U.S. strategy and America’s defense posture will be dramatically impacted over the coming decade by reduced spending on defense and national security. Whether in rebalancing America’s stategic focus to the Asia-Pacific region; realigning the force structure of the armed forces, especially the U.S. Army; pursuing counterterrorism and other security priorities; and seeking contributions from allies and partners, American policymakers can no longer ignore cost and budgetary constraints when it comes to shaping U.S. strategy and rightsizing America’s global security role. Rebalance Rethinking the Cost of U.S. […]

No topic in American security inspires more heated debate these days than the Obama administration’s use of drone strikes against armed militants, terrorists and their supporters. While debate and scrutiny of public policy is a good thing, a hefty proportion of this criticism is badly misguided, often mistaking the use of drones as America’s strategy itself. In large part this reflects a failure on the part of the Obama administration to develop a convincing narrative to explain the assumptions, logic and ultimate objectives of its strategy. Without seeing the big picture, it is difficult to understand how drone strikes fit […]

Park Geun-hye’s term as South Korean president begins at a time of serious tension on the Korean Peninsula, with North Korea defying international pressure and going ahead with a nuclear test earlier this month. During her campaign, Park had said that as president she would work to mend ties with Pyongyang, which had deteriorated under the government of now-former President Lee Myung-bak, and develop a mutually beneficial partnership that would pave the way for eventual reunification. But along with complications caused by North Korea’s third nuclear test and a general climate of discord, the composition of Park’s government will make […]

One of the issues newly inaugurated South Korean President Park Geun-hye will need to address is the demands from a growing faction of her own party for either the United States to return tactical nuclear weapons to the South or for Seoul to develop its own nuclear arsenal. In light of the apparently successful Feb. 12 North Korean nuclear test, this faction believes that Seoul needs a similar nuclear capability to deter potential North Korean military threats. Extended deterrence of the kind the U.S. currently provides South Korea requires that the guarantor has the capacity to defend the country threatened […]

Before departing from her position as U.S. secretary of state, Hillary Clinton stated at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing that al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) is “not only a terrorist syndicate, it is a criminal enterprise.” Recognizing the interconnected nature of these multifaceted illicit networks, Clinton affirmed that to combat them, “we’ve got to have a better strategy.” The former top U.S. diplomat was voicing a conviction increasingly shared by governments and multilateral organizations around the world, which are beginning to recognize that today’s most pressing security challenges are too connected, transnational and vast for states to confront […]

Will Ban Ki-moon leave a substantial legacy when he completes his second term as secretary-general of the United Nations at the end of 2016? This question may seem premature. Ban has been in office for more than six years, but he has nearly four more to go. Yet, as Ban has already discovered, a U.N. secretary-general’s schedule is consumed by a mix of urgent crises and hollow diplomatic rituals. Last week, for example, Ban oversaw the signing of a new peace deal for the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, but also had to make time for a speech launching the […]

Macky Sall, who was inaugurated as president of Senegal last April, came to power amid massive discontent with his predecessor, President Abdoulaye Wade. Critics, including youth protest movements Y En A Marre (“Enough is Enough”) and M23 (named for a 2011 demonstration), accused Wade of failing to address core economic and infrastructure problems while enriching himself and suppressing dissent. In an address to the nation one day after taking office, Sall listed economic issues as being among his administration’s top priorities. “It is a matter of urgency in our cities and our suburbs,” he stated, “to fight unemployment, flooding, insecurity […]

Earlier this month, the Japanese Defense Ministry said two Russian fighter jets had violated its airspace, roughly a month after Japan announced a similar violation by China. In an email interview, Richard Bitzinger, an expert in Asia-Pacific military modernization at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University, discussed the state of the Japanese Air Self-Defense Forces and Japan’s response to regional tensions. WPR: What is the current state of the Japanese Air Self-Defense Force (JASDF)? Richard Bitzinger: Historically, the JASDF has been the most powerful air force in East Asia, and, for the most part, it still maintains a strong reputation. It comprises […]

Until the end of the Cold War in the late-1980s, U.S. policy in East Africa and the Horn tried to balance regional security concerns with support for economic development and mitigating food shortages and famines. The primary goal of U.S. policy in the region was to minimize Soviet influence and that of China, Eastern Europe and Cuba. As the Cold War came to an end, the United States added to its policy agenda the objectives of encouraging democratic governance and improving human rights practices. In the post-Cold War era, the primary U.S. human rights and governance concerns in the region […]

Armed groups proliferate like rabbits in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. From the state’s collapse in the early 1990s through two wars at the turn of the 21st century to today, the lack of government control over the country’s territory makes it easy for a few dozen — or a few thousand — men to take up arms, tax local populations, exploit natural resources and engage in massive human rights abuses against civilian populations. The DRC’s numerous armed groups are formed for a diverse array of reasons, ranging from legitimate concerns over land rights in the country’s eastern Kivu […]

The list of of nations with nuclear weapons continues to grow. First it was the United States and the Soviet Union. They were soon followed by the United Kingdom, France then China. Later, India, Israel, Pakistan and North Korea joined. South Africa was a member of the club for a while, before abandoning its program. Iran will become a nuclear power some day, even if the United States or Israel postpones it a bit with an attack. A growing number of other states could build nuclear weapons in short order if they wanted to, including South Korea, Taiwan, Japan, Brazil […]

At a press briefing Monday, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman responded to North Korea’s Feb. 12 nuclear test by calling for all parties to avoid taking action that could worsen the situation on the Korean Peninsula. While China expressed its opposition to the test, Beijing also stated its desire to see an early resumption of the Six-Party Talks seeking a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula and called for the Security Council to adopt measures that would seek “realization of denuclearization, nonproliferation, and peace and stability on the peninsula.” Meanwhile, Chinese news commentary blamed U.S. intransigence as much as DPRK recklessness for the […]

In Bangladesh, daily protests over war crimes tribunals are turning deadly. Thirteen people have died as thousands have demonstrated against what is perceived as a culture of impunity for war crimes allegedly committed during Bangladesh’s 1971 war of independence from Pakistan. Demonstrations have intensified since they began 10 days ago, after Abdul Quader Mollah, a leader of the Islamist party Jamaat-e-Islami, was convicted of war crimes and sentenced to life in prison. Many protesters see the life sentence as too lenient and are demanding the death penalty for Mollah. Meanwhile, as the government continues to prosecute defendants accused of committing […]

The looming threat of sequestration is presenting the American national security community with a dilemma. Outgoing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has laid out what some of the consequences will be if Congress and the president cannot agree on a plan to rescind the automatic spending cuts that are set to go into effect next month: One of the two U.S. aircraft carrier groups deployed to the Persian Gulf region will be withdrawn; deployments to Latin America will be canceled; and the U.S. presence in Europe will be reduced. Panetta even warned that a diminished U.S. military presence overseas would, over […]