How Prepared is Germany and the EU for 21st Century Geo-political Competition?

01/26/2020
By Kenneth Maxwell Angela Merkel has been in power for 14 years. She was first elected as chancellor of Germany in 2005. She was then re-elected in 2009, and again in 2013, and for a further term in 2018. She plans to stay on until 2021. 67% of Germans approve of…

Europe and the Libyan Crisis: Geopolitics of a European Union or Traditional European Geopolitics?

01/25/2020
By Pierre Tran Paris - The next few weeks will be critical for Libya as much depends on opposing sides of the civil war maintaining a fragile ceasefire and their foreign backers observing an arms embargo, Tarek Megerisi, policy fellow at the European Council for Foreign Relations, said in a…

Chancellor Merkel’s Financial Times Interview: Shaping a Way Ahead for Germany

01/24/2020
By Robbin Laird Recently, The Financial Times published an interview between their editor and their Berlin bureau chief and Chancellor Merkel. It was interesting for both what it said and what it did not say about the challenges facing Germany and Europe in the period ahead. Unlike President Macron, the…

Europe and Its Borders: FRONTEX Builds Out its Force

01/23/2020
Clearly, the migration crisis in Europe has generated fundamental pressures for change. According to Chloe-Alexandra Laird: "The migration crises, due to its multiple trigger points, should not be considered as only one crisis but as many that intertwine and currently impedes European progress to move forward. "The major influx of…

Building Out the Fleet with Maritime Remotes and AI: The UK Case

01/22/2020
The US, the UK and Australia are working closely together with regard on developing maritime remote systems to work with and transform their maritime fleets. Recently, the UK Ministry of Defence announced a new round of funding for their efforts in this area, The Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA) has…

USMC Aviation: Looking Back to the 2010s and Forward to the 2020s

01/20/2020
By Robbin Laird The significant change in USMC aviation since the introduction of the Osprey has set in motion fundamental changes overall in USMC capabilities and concepts of operations. In the past decade, the Osprey has matured as a combat platform and fostered significant change in concepts of operations. No…

Prospects for Brazil in 2020: Part Three

01/19/2020
By Kenneth Maxwell Social and Racial Divisions The social and racial divisions have not improved over the past 15 years since Tuca Vieira took his iconic photograph. It was in Paraisopolos, now the second largest favela in São Paulo, where 100,000 people live, that nine young people, attending the weekend…

Shaping High End Integrated Training: The Australian Case

01/19/2020
By Andrew McLaughlin The RAAF graduates a growing number of Air Warfare Instructors across multiple skillsets They are among the RAAF best of the best – the latest batch of Air Warfare Instructor (AWI) capability subject matter experts showing they have what it takes to emerge as graduates of the biennial…