On April 28, 2025, at precisely 12:33 CEST, the lights went out across the Iberian Peninsula. What began as a voltage surge at a solar installation in Spain cascaded into a massive blackout affecting nearly 60 million people across Spain and Portugal, lasting approximately 10 hours in most areas. The…
When Russia, a nation whose territory extends into the Arctic Circle, positions itself as part of the "Global South," it reveals something fundamental about how international relations have evolved beyond simple geographic boundaries. The term "Global South," increasingly used by organizations and coalitions worldwide, has become less about hemispheres and…
By Robbin Laird In the shadowy world of 18th-century colonial Brazil, monks conducted business through holes in convent walls, French diplomats openly discussed bribing governors, and British ships feigned distress to access forbidden ports. This wasn't the chaotic underworld we might imagine. It was a sophisticated economic system that would…
By Robbin Laird In an era of unprecedented global uncertainty, Australia faces a critical question: Can the nation mobilize its industrial base quickly enough to meet emerging security challenges? According to Matt Jones (seen above in the featured photo), Head of Future Business Defence Delivery at BAE Systems Australia, the…
By Robbin Laird My friend and colleague Erik Hoffmann and I worked extensively on analyzing the efforts to change the Soviet system under the pressures of the technological revolution of the 1970s and 1980s. This was when Brzezinski published his book on the technotronic age and described the challenges a…
By Pierre Tran Paris - The Chinese navy was large, growing fast, and led by a complex command structure which showed an aggressive approach in operations at sea, the navy chief of staff, Admiral Nicolas Vaujour, told the Association des Journalistes de Défense (AJD) Sept. 3. Meanwhile, the Russian navy…
When Vladimir Putin launched his "special military operation" against Ukraine on February 24, 2022, he envisioned a swift victory that would restore Russia's great power status. Instead, the invasion has triggered one of the most devastating scientific brain drains in modern history, systematically dismantling the mathematics and physics capabilities that…
In 1970, the rolling hills and vast plains of Ukraine served as the backdrop for one of cinema's most ambitious war epics. Sergei Bondarchuk's "Waterloo" transformed the Soviet republic into 19th-century Belgium, with thousands of Red Army soldiers marching across Ukrainian soil to recreate Napoleon's final defeat. More than five…
