Secretary of State Pompeo’s direct and fiery demand earlier this week that Iran withdraw from Syria overshadowed President Putin’s indirect and polite request during last week’s Sochi Summit for the same, thereby putting Syria on the spot in having to publicly deny that any such talks were ongoing in order to “save face”, though the…
China is stepping up its involvement in Syria, not with its military, but with cash – and lots of it. For Beijing, war-torn Syria is a golden opportunity for reconstruction business. For Damascus, prosperity means peace. China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi and his Syrian counterpart Walid Muallem have shown through their cordial discussions that Beijing and…
Sofia is proceeding from the assumption that any de-facto revival of the South Stream pipeline would make it a pivotal player in the New Cold War, and contrary to most people’s initial reactions, Moscow might actually be interested. Bulgarian President Rumen Radev told Russia’s famous business publication Kommersant that his country wants to receive direct…
One years ago Trump pledged allegiance to the Wahhabi Orb. The one Orb that rules them all: This swearing of an oath to the Wahhabi death star was part of the opening of the potemkinesk “Global Center for Combating Extremist Ideology” in Riyadh. … The Saudis arranged the whole theater to flatter Trump into fighting…
President Trump’s announcement that he intends to order the US military out of Syria attracted a lot of public attention, unlike the war preparations that preceded and followed those statements. Three months ago, the American military established an outpost in Manbij, in the wake of Turkey’s threats to seize control of the area. The US has some 300 soldiers based at two…
Do you have the nagging sense that our empire is in decline? If so, don’t be embarrassed by it. Historically speaking, we’re in very good company. Far larger and longer-lived empires than ours have come and gone over the millennia. This was hit home for me on a recent trip. I scored a major “dad win”…
