2013-10-03 by Robbin Laird The PRC leadership clearly has growing global aspirations. It is also a leadership living on top of a caldron of economic and ethnic dynamics. The two can actually go together, in terms of global play and reach being a means of containing domestic pressures. Obviously, the…
2013-10-01 By Robbin Laird Recently, we published a comprehensive report by Richard Weitz on Azerbaijan. Weitz argued that: The Republic of Azerbaijan is a close U.S. ally since Azerbaijanis regained their independence following the Soviet Union’s collapse. It has become a prominent role model for Muslim-majority nations seeking to manage…
2013-09-30 by Chloé-Alexandra Laird I had the honor in June of this year to ask a couple of questions to Michel Adrien, a witness to the B17 crash in the town of Noirmoutier, France on July 4th, 1943. Q: How old were you when you witnessed this American plane crash…
2013-09-30 By Guy Martin The US military has stopped flying unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) from its main African base in Djibouti after a string of crashes, moving operations to a remote desert airstrip. Camp Lemonnier, next to Djibouti’s international airport, is the only official American military base on the African continent…
2013-9-29 By Robbin Laird Clearly, when one looks back on 2008, the actions against Georgia were the beginning of a more assertive Russian policy. A line in the sand was placed on NATO expansion, and neither the United States nor Europe have really crossed that line since then. With the…
2013-09-26 By Robbin Laird The United States is no longer a superpower. It is clearly a significant global power. The period where the Soviet Union collapsed and left the US in a lopsided leadership position was a clear anomaly. This period is in the rear view mirror. Some asserted during…
2013-09-23 By Ed Timperlake John Boyd in his lecture (which I sat through twice) had a sine qua non building block for his work: the F-86 versus Mig-15 exchange rate kills by his beloved F-86 in "MIG Ally. " The exchange rate was approximately 10 to 1. Lessons learned at…
2013-09-22 Brazil is the 6th largest economy in the world. It is also a leader of a significant group of developing nations which is called the BRIC nations. This term refers to the developing countries of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. The NSA spy scandal has clearly hurt U.S. national security interests.…
