Great op-ed by Bret Stephens in The New York Times: Walter Lippmann, nobody’s idea of a right-wing reactionary, put his finger on the problem in the tragic wake of another supposedly golden era of arms control. “The disarmament movement,” he wrote in 1943, proved “tragically successful in disarming the nations that believed in disarmament.” In […]
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Zapad was not a test for the West
Igor Fedyk tries to derive some conclusions about the just finished Zapad 2017 exercise in this piece called Zapad 2017: A Test for the West for Jamestown.org. I think some of his points are somewhat sensationalistic, though, and Fedyk partly falls into the trap of confusing the nature of warfare with sinister intentions on behalf […]
Finland and the art of self-reliance in national defense
Good look at the defense philosophy in Finland by Teri Schultz in DW. And what a contrast to many other countries in the Baltic region that have perfected the art of being dependent on USA. President Sauli Niinisto says Finland – with a population of 5.2 million, a border with Russia that runs 1,340 kilometers […]
What are Russian leaders afraid of?
Not entirely new but very thorough description of how the Russian leadership perceives the strategic role and threats against Russia by Dmitry Gorenburg for Russia in Global Affairs. Fundamentally Gorenburg describes an interesting combination of aggressive behavior grounded in a perception of a defensive struggle that from a Western perspective can be hard to understand. […]
Europe should prepare to defend itself without America
Europe desires a fundamentally disinterested protector, but the European countries better realize that America’s unwillingness to provide that security will continue to grow, writes Jeremy Shapiro in this insightful piece in [War On The Rocks] [WTHR link]: But presidential incompetence and the public’s lack of interest is a weak foundation on which to build a […]
Sweden to buy new air-defense system
The Baltic Post: Swedish policymakers have made clear that they wish to update the air-defense system by 2020, and this tight deadline has narrowed down the options to two systems, which are already developed and widely in use. The first is the Patriot, developed by U.S. defense giant Raytheon, and the second is French-Italian Eurosam’s […]
Russia’s biggest army is directed at its own people
I’ve been wanting to link to this for a while. Igor Torbakov has a really interesting analysis in Utrikesmagasinet about the possible meaning of the restructuring of the domestic forces into the Federal National Guard Service, Rosgvardiya. According to Torbakov the motivation can be found in this: “Western politicians do not understand the essence of […]
Pessimistic farewell by outgoing EU ambassador to Russia
Outgoing EU ambassador to Russia, the Lithuanian diplomat Vygaudas Ušackas, has a pessimistic farewell message in The Guardian: When I arrived in Moscow as the EU’s ambassador to Russia four years ago, relations between the two blocs were strained but functional. Within months, though, Russia would annex Crimea and intervene militarily in eastern Ukraine, plunging […]
Russia continues move to more professional military
Russia has called in 134,000 new conscripts to begin 12 months of military training in the fourth quarter of 2017. The schedule is such that new recruits begin in the second and fourth quarters, and together with the spring draft the total number for 2017 is up to 276,000 conscripts. Although that is a very […]
Worrying initiatives to improve navigational safety in US Navy
The US Navy attempts to improve navigational safety in the wake of a series of accidents involving ships from the Pacific Fleet, reports Geoff Ziezulewicz for Navy Times after obtaining a command message outlining some of the initiatives. The list of revised procedures does give grounds for some worry, though. It starts off well enough. […]