Military Archive

On Dec. 1, during Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-o-cha’s first visit to Kuala Lumpur, he and his Malaysian counterpart, Prime Minister Najib Razak, agreed on the conditions to restart peace efforts to resolve the deadly southern Thailand insurgency. While the resumption of Malaysia-hosted peace talks between the Thai state and Malay-Muslim rebels is an encouraging sign, the parties are likely to encounter formidable challenges as they attempt to structure a political solution that will lead to a durable peace and end Southeast Asia’s most lethal ongoing conflict. Since the latest outbreak of the insurgency in Thailand’s Malay-Muslim-majority southernmost provinces in […]

U.S. President Barack Obama’s strategy to defeat the so-called Islamic State (IS) only deals with half of the problem. That militant organization grew powerful in part because the Iraqi government led by former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki was more interested in entrenching Shiite control than in building a stable, inclusive political system. This alienated Sunni Arabs and allowed the Iraqi military to decay through sectarianism and corruption. But IS was also born out of armed resistance to the parasitic dictatorship of President Bashar al-Assad in Syria. In a very real sense, it took not one but two repressive, inept governments […]

Fifty years from now, when historians look back at 2014, they will likely be struck by how many seemingly contradictory trends co-exist in today’s world. The crisis in Ukraine suggests a fraying of the liberal international order and its consensus against territorial conquest, even as relatively robust international crisis-management mechanisms manage to deter or contain conflict elsewhere. A global rise of anti-pluralist populism has led to the resurgence of nationalism at the same time that national sovereignty is increasingly embedded in a globally integrated and largely supranational economic order. In Asia, historical grievances at times slow down but cannot derail […]

The recent announcement that investigators seized a metric ton of cash, jewels, antiques and other luxury goods from the villa of retired Gen. Xu Caihou sheds new light on corruption within China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Xu, who had been a vice chairman of the Chinese Communist Party’s powerful Central Military Commission (CMC), was the second senior PLA commander to be charged with corruption in recent years. In 2012, Gen. Gu Junshan, a deputy commander of the PLA General Logistics Department, was detained after years of rumors that he had been involved in under-the-table deals involving PLA-controlled land. Several active […]

Last month, Indonesia announced that it will create a coast guard in an effort to reduce smuggling and piracy. In an email interview, Brian Harding, director for East and Southeast Asia at the Center for American Progress, discussed Indonesia’s naval capabilities. WPR: What is the current state of Indonesia’s navy and maritime security forces, in terms of vessels and operational preparedness? Brian Harding: Indonesia has set its sights on becoming an effective “green-water navy,” meaning it can operate in its coastal waters, but it has a long way to go. It currently boasts a total naval strength of 213 ships, […]

Last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Raul Khadzhimba, president of the breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia, signed a pact in Sochi establishing closer ties between Russia and Abkhazia. The agreement gives Russia more control over the region, which Moscow recognizes as an independent country, while extending to Abkhazians a streamlined path to Russian citizenship. It also pledges to modernize Abkhazia’s military in close cooperation with the existing Russian military presence there, and to integrate Abkhazia into the Eurasian Economic Union, Putin’s nascent alternative to the European Union. In combination with Russia’s annexation of Crimea from Ukraine earlier this year, […]