Military & Security

Jacob Heilbrunn and Robert Silverman How should the US balance democratic principles with the need to confront groups that shift between ballots and bombs? Calls to ban the Muslim Brotherhood are gaining renewed momentum in Washington, reviving a debate that has long divided policymakers over how democracies should …

For all the controversy that trails him, Donald Trump has a record of inserting himself into geopolitical standoffs and sometimes lowering the temperature. During his first term, he broke decades of taboo by meeting Kim Jong Un in Singapore in 2018 and again at the DMZ in 2019, …

The confluence of two accelerating trends augurs poorly for critical mineral-rich economies in the Global South: the rise of economic nationalism in advanced economies and the return of territorial conquest as a normalized—if not yet fully legitimized—tool of statecraft. The United States and the European Union are aggressively …

By Dr. Shehab Al-Makahleh In a private meeting with geopolitical analyst George Friedman in 2022, and during an earlier conversation with the late Henry Kissinger in 2021, both thinkers alluded to the strategic inevitabilities of conflict in the Middle East. Strategist Friedman warned that the region was heading …

Rany Ballout Unifying and deradicalizing Syria’s armed forces will be the regime’s most formidable challenge. The United States has now lifted all sanctions on Syria, except on some individuals and entities associated with the former Assad regime. Additionally, the United States has revoked the foreign terrorist organization designation …

John Calabrese The recent Israel-Iran crisis could catalyze an expanded role for the Gulf states in maintaining regional security. The June eruption of hostilities between Israel and Iran once again exposed the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries to the acute dangers of regional instability. Yet it also raises …

Washington must clarify what it actually wants from New Delhi in order to secure a mutually beneficial trade agreement. President Trump has imposed a 25 percent tariff on India, prompted by the failure to conclude a trade deal before the reciprocal tariff deadline of August 1. In a …

Matthew Maavak There is a well-worn rhetorical device deployed from Islamabad to Istanbul, echoed with minor variations across various Muslim-majority capitals: Kashmir is the Palestine of South Asia. But what appears on the surface as a passionate defense of Muslim dignity is in fact a geopolitical sleight of …

Staikou Dimitra  “And what didn’t you do to bury me — but you forgot that I was a seed.” — Dinos Christianopoulos These haunting words by the Greek poet evoke the resilience of dissent. But in today’s geopolitical climate, they also echo the perilous cost of speech — …