With the world focused on the scary possibility of war on the Korean Peninsula, not many people paid much attention to a series of naval exercises this past July in the Malacca Strait, a 550-mile long passage between Sumatra and Malaysia through which pass over 50,000 ships a year. With President Trump and North Korean …
Continue reading Rolling Snake Eyes in the Indo-Pacific
So Donald Trump revealed his hand on Jerusalem. In so doing, he tossed aside any lingering pretence of the US being able to broker a deal between Israel and Palestine. There can be no "neutrality" now. Without Jerusalem as its capital, no Palestinian state can exist. Without that it is only a matter of time …
Continue reading The Axis of Arab Autocrats Who Are Standing Behind Donald Trump
President Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital is not only a clear violation of international law, but a moral outrage when it comes to its contempt for and violation of the rights of the Palestinian people. Under the stewardship of Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel has embraced with unfailing ardor a rejectionist stance on Palestinian statehood. He knows …
Trump doesn’t like being compared to Obama, but this time it’s impossible not to see the similarities. Both candidates represented a promising break from the past and swore to reverse the failed policies of their predecessors, and each were elected out of the desperation that most Americans were feeling at the time, whether real or …
Continue reading The Olympics and Jerusalem: Disillusionment Confirmed
US President Donald Trump makes one of the most protracted and painful world problems sound like he’s selling a condo between two parties. With cheesy easiness, he bluffs everybody gets a “great deal.” “We want an agreement that is a great deal for the Israelis and a great deal for the Palestinians.” Thus spoke Trump …
Continue reading Trump’s Jerusalem Move a Good Thing… US Pretense of ‘Honest Broker’ Finally Ends
In the context of the New Great Game in Eurasia, the New Silk Roads, known as the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), integrates all of China’s instruments of national power – political, economic, diplomatic, financial, intellectual and cultural – to shape the 21st century geopolitical/geoeconomic order. BRI is the organizing concept of China’s foreign policy …
Continue reading The New Great Game Moves From Asia-Pacific to Indo-Pacific
Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have formed a new military and trade partnership separate from the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). The move came on the eve of the GCC summit in Kuwait, which opened on Dec.5. The top-level meeting was supposed to last for two days but was closed in a few hours to end …
Continue reading Saudi Arabia and the UAE Forge New Military Alliance
Unfortunately, the long awaited diplomatic breakthrough in the ongoing Syrian settlement process, which was discussed at the end of the last month by the leaders of Russia, Turkey and Iran in Sochi, failed to come to fruition. On the very same day that Putin was holding negotiations in Sochi he was contacted by Israeli Prime Minister …
Continue reading With Everybody on the Winner’s Side Syria Found Itself Over a Barrel
The best solutions to difficult problems are simple. The Columbus Egg. The Gordian Knot. The Procrustean Bed. So many people strained their fingers trying to untangle the messy knot, until Alexander came and slashed it open with one fine stroke of his mighty sword. Wise men vainly tried to make an egg stand upright on …
Continue reading Saudi Gangster Crown Prince Shows the Way for Trump and Putin to Follow
