Defense & Security Archive

MEXICO CITY—Every weekday at 7 a.m., President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador holds a press conference at the National Palace here in Mexico’s capital. Known as the “mananera,” the marathon sessions set the news cycle, but also function similarly to President Donald Trump’s Twitter account, offering opportunities for Lopez Obrador to troll opponents and rally supporters as he pontificates for two hours to a blurry-eyed press corps. Last month, Lopez Obrador, who is popularly known as AMLO, raised eyebrows at one of these events when he suggested that the public should know the full details of then-confidential corruption allegations made by […]

In the 19 years that have passed since I watched the twin towers of the World Trade Center collapse, not a single moment of that day has faded from memory. It was my second day on the job as a cub reporter for the New York Daily News, and I am still a bit embarrassed to admit I was running a little late that morning. I had stopped at the elementary school polling station near my apartment in Queens to cast my vote in the mayoral primaries at around 9 a.m. A few minutes later, as I hustled to catch […]

French President Emmanuel Macron has clearly decided to up the ante in a standoff with Turkey in the Eastern Mediterranean, where France is backing Greece and Cyprus in their dispute with Ankara over natural gas reserves and maritime boundaries. First, Macron ordered a temporary reinforcement of French aerial and naval assets to the Eastern Mediterranean in mid-August, in response to Turkish ships resuming controversial gas exploration activities south of Cyprus. Then, he went as far as to frame his actions as a “red line policy” in order to show President Recep Tayyip Erdogan that he meant business. Although France’s military […]

When al-Qaida targeted the centers of American financial and military power on 9/11, it believed that most of the world would welcome seeing the United States knocked down from its perch of power. Whether by accident or by design, Osama bin Laden, al-Qaida’s leader and founder, had formulated his strategy based on an interpretation of classical realist theory, predicting that countries seeking to balance against American hegemony would be disinclined to get involved in any conflict that followed the attacks. Instead, while the ruins of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon still smoldered, leaders around the world pledged their […]

In the early hours of Aug. 19, five men in various shades and styles of military fatigues took to Mali’s national TV station to introduce themselves. The mid-ranking officers had begun the previous day with a mutiny in the garrison town of Kati and ended it by arresting the president, Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, in the capital, Bamako. Malians had been glued to their TV sets for hours. First, they watched a detained Keita offer his resignation and dissolve the Malian government on live TV. Then, they met the anonymous men in berets who were now in charge—and still are. Calling […]

Editor’s Note: Every Friday, Andrew Green curates the top news and analysis from and about the African continent. In an effort to preempt a damning report on massive overpricing and potential fraud in the country’s $26 billion COVID-19 response, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa moved to crack down on corruption within the ruling African National Congress this week. Analysts see it as Ramaphosa’s attempt to finally seize control of a party plagued by graft and the legacy of his predecessor, Jacob Zuma. Following a weekend meeting of the ANC’s executive committee, Ramaphosa announced that party officials charged with corruption must […]

On July 24, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan joined thousands of worshippers in the streets around the historic Hagia Sophia in Istanbul for a doubly symbolic moment. Surrounded by a swarm of politicians, soldiers, security forces and imams, the Turkish leader made his way into the giant, former Byzantine cathedral through doors once hammered open by conquering Ottoman soldiers in 1453. Inside, he read out the namaz, or Muslim prayer, formally turning the 1,500-year-old building back into a mosque. In doing so, Erdogan was turning the page on nine decades of recent history, during which this extraordinary structure and UNESCO […]