Executive Summary: The Yemeni Civil War has ground on for eight years now, with the Houthi rebels controlling a majority of the country, and the power of the Internationally Recognized Government and Southern Transitional Council's forces seriously degraded. Many smaller armed militia groups and warlord... MORE

Executive Summary: Executive Summary: Whatever the battlefield outcome after the completion of U.S. military drawdown in Afghanistan at the end of this month, Turkey will be a pivotal player in the country moving forward. This will likely be the case not only for the security... MORE

Executive Summary: Despite early claims of victory by the Ethiopian government, its war against the Tigray based Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) shows no signs of ending. Instead, the TPLF, which is a capable and well-armed force, could launch a protracted guerrilla war. Such a... MORE

Executive Summary: Major NATO nations have already begun receiving fifth generation aircraft, while some others, such as France and Germany, have preferred temporarily flying with 4.5 generation platforms in order to make a long jump directly into sixth generation airpower in the coming decades. Against... MORE

Executive summary: After five years of war against the Saudi-led coalition and its allies, Yemen’s Houthi rebels remain defiant and are once again on the offensive. The Houthis’ keen understanding and consistent application of the algebra of insurgency are fundamental to their martial success in... MORE

Executive Summary: Defeats, plummeting oil prices, and a global pandemic are forcing Saudi Arabia to rethink its involvement in Yemen. Ironically, the end of overt Saudi involvement in Yemen may help it achieve some of its aims as new alliances dilute Houthi control and minimize... MORE

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Since its announcement in 2015, Russia’s proposed Nord Stream Two natural gas pipeline has remained the infrastructure project posing the largest single threat to the energy and national security of the European Union and Ukraine. The year 2019 witnessed the culmination of years... MORE

Executive Summary Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri’s long-game strategy has created international networks with the ultimate intention of creating a united Islamic Emirate to take the place of the lost Ottoman Caliphate, across a continuous band from Turkistan to the Atlantic coast. [1] Bruce Hoffman brought... MORE

Executive summary: The battle for access and influence in the Horn of Africa is intensifying as the Gulf States, Turkey, and China race to secure footholds. At the same time, rivalries between Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Qatar, and Turkey are shaping how... MORE

Executive Summary March 26th marked the end of the fourth year of the Saudi led war in Yemen. Four years of devastating aerial bombing and tens of billions of dollars have borne few results. The Houthis retain control of the northwest and most of Yemen has... MORE

Executive Summary  On February 10, Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika made a decision to run for a fifth mandate. This decision triggered nationwide protests, showing how the regime might have been formally stable but has grown increasingly unsustainable, particularly among the country’s younger population. After weeks... MORE

On June 13, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, in conjunction with their Yemeni allies, launched “Operation Golden Victory.” The grandiosely named offensive is aimed at seizing the Yemeni Red Sea port of Hodeidah, which has been occupied by Yemen’s... MORE

On December 4, Ali Abdullah Saleh, Yemen’s former president, was assassinated by Houthi rebels. Saleh’s death was precipitated by his attempt to end his alliance with the Houthis. His assassination marks the end of an important chapter in the history of modern Yemen and will... MORE

Of all the potential terrorist hotspots in the world today, Niger is an unlikely country to take center stage. However, the killing of four members of U.S. Special Forces in Niger, near the border with Mali and Burkina Faso, on October 4, has forced the... MORE

On January 14, Tunisians marked the sixth anniversary of their successful revolution against the regime of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. Known as the “Jasmine Revolution,” it inspired other people in the region to take to the streets, starting the so-called “Arab Spring.” Six years... MORE

The recent major terrorist attacks in Paris and Brussels represent a watershed moment not just for the Islamic State (IS), but for the entire jihadist movement. The attacks mark the first time that a single jihadist network has succeeded in carrying out two separate mass... MORE

In recent months, there have been key developments and insights regarding the notable number of Belgians fighting in Syria and Iraq. A recruitment organization whose existence was unearthed during a series of trials turned out to be one of the most active; the direct implication... MORE

On January 16, Tsai Ing-wen of Taiwan’s opposition party, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), swept the presidency with 56 percent of the vote. The election also marked a major win in the concurrent legislative election, where DPP for the first time secured a majority, winning... MORE

Executive Summary This Hot Issue discusses the attack that the Islamic State commanded and claimed in Jakarta on January 14, 2016. It looks at the “progeny” of the attack, namely the mastermind, Barhun Naim, and the Katibah [Brigade] behind the attack, the “profiles” of the... MORE

Executive Summary On October 18, 2015, a DAESH promoter posted a 63-page English-language manual entitled Safety and Security Guidelines for Lone Wolf Mujahideen on Twitter. [1] Reportedly, three former members of Saddam Hussein’s intelligence service now with this jihadist organization in Raqqa, Syria, produced the... MORE

President Xi announced a 300,000-personnel reduction at the 70th anniversary military parade (China Military Online, September 3). The reduction represents the most significant element of the current military reforms so far made public. Less contentious elements of the reform plan regarding training, rules and regulations,... MORE

Executive Summary On March 25, Saudi Arabia and its coalition partners launched air strikes and implemented a naval blockade against Yemen to weaken Yemen’s Zaydi Shi’a Houthis and to reinstall the exiled government of Yemeni President Abd Rabbu Mansur al-Hadi. Operation Decisive Storm has now... MORE

Executive Summary The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) on March 24 began launching airstrikes against Yemen’s Zaydi Shi’a Houthi movement (who refer to themselves as Ansar Allah—the supporters of God) and its allies, who are led by the nominally Zaydi former president Ali Abdullah Saleh. The... MORE

Executive Summary The authorities in Iran consider the Islamic State to pose two different kinds of threats to Iranian regional interests and domestic stability. On the one hand, the rise of the Islamic State in Syria and in Iraq threaten Tehran’s geopolitical interests as two... MORE

Executive Summary The Russian Federation uses extensive propaganda, outright lies, and—most importantly—disinformation as part of the hybrid warfare it is waging against Ukraine and the West. Disinformation combines truth, what people want to be true, and cleverly disguised outright falsehoods. Moscow has been actively using... MORE

Executive Summary The Russia-supported separatists operating in eastern Ukraine as well as some of their backers in Russia are increasingly espousing a radical ideology based on a meld of Christian Orthodoxy, expansionist Eurasianism, and irredentist state aggression. One important figure closely tied into this group... MORE

Executive Summary On the first day of Ramadan (June 28), the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) declared itself the new Islamic State and the new Caliphate (Khilafah). For the occasion, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, calling himself Caliph Ibrahim, broke with his customary secrecy to... MORE

Executive Summary The recent advance of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and collapse of a quarter the Iraqi Army has created both opportunities and threats for the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG). With Baghdad occupied by the crisis, the KRG has been able... MORE

Executive Summary Russia’s March 17 annexation of Crimea capped nearly two decades of increasingly fractious Russian-Ukrainian relations, punctuated by rising tensions over Russia’s lease of Sevastopol and natural gas transit and cost issues. The election of the pro-Russian Viktor Yanukovych as president in March 2010... MORE

Executive Summary On May 12, 2013, Boko Haram’s leader, Abubakar Shekau, demanded in a video that all Boko Haram prisoners, which number in the hundreds in Nigeria, Cameroon and Niger, be released before he orders the return of more than 250 girls kidnapped in April.... MORE

Executive Summary As the Western world is drawn in by the recent events in the Crimea, nations on the periphery are seeing a chance to use the widening gulf between Russia and the United States/EU to further their own aims. A debate has already begun... MORE

Executive SummaryTo date, the besieged Ukrainian government has largely avoided deploying the Armed Forces against the Maidan protesters, even when the situation has devolved into serious street violence with the police. The Ukrainian military itself, on the other hand, has made it a point to... MORE

Turkey’s Navy in Throes of Massive Expansion  The Mediterranean, history’s first naval battleground, is seeing the rise of a new regional naval power – Turkey. In a demonstration of its new abilities, the Türk Deniz Kuvvetleri (Turkish Navy) began its Invitex-Dogu Akdeniz-2013 naval exercise on... MORE

                Executive SummaryTwo years ago, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s assassination by Western-backed rebels (October 20, 2011) marked the end of all-out civil war and the collapse of the state in Libya. The United States and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) based their case for... MORE

General Vo Nguyen Giap, the diminutive military giant and author of the military defeats of both the French and the United States in Vietnam, died on October 4 at the age of 102. In a career that began with guerrilla attacks on Vichy French outposts... MORE

Expelled from their main sources of financing, consumed by internal disputes and under constant pressure from African Union troops in the field, Somalia’s al-Shabaab movement and its leader Abdi Godane “Abu Zubayr” have rolled the dice with a massive attack on civilians in Nairobi with... MORE

When a pair of suicide bombings occurred almost simultaneously at important economic and military targets in Niger last week, it raised the specter of broadening Salafi-Jihadist activities paralyzing the political and economic development of a vast stretch of north and west Africa. Niger, possibly the... MORE

Summary Libya’s quasi-parliament recently approved a political isolation law prohibiting a range of Qaddafi-era officials from political office or taking government jobs. The law was passed over the objections of the government and after revolutionary militias blockaded key ministries, refusing to leave until the measure... MORE

To gain a perspective on so-called “home grown” jihadist terrorism, two models are especially enlightening. The first is the report by the New York City Police Department (NYPD): “Radicalization In The West: The Home Grown Threat.” [1] The other model is prescriptive and can be... MORE

In connection with the tragic events in Boston, some Western journalists have started pursuing sensational angles to the story concerning the purported ties between the alleged elder Boston Marathon bomber, Tamerlan Tsnarnaev, and a Dagestani militant who went by the name of Mahmud Mansur Nidal... MORE

Executive Summary  After four consecutive presidential terms and fifteen years in office, Hugo Chávez died on March 5 leaving behind a mixed legacy. While his supporters proudly call him El Comandante and vow to continue his socialist revolution, others decry his parochial economic policies, which have left... MORE

On Thursday, March 7, federal officials broke the news that Sulayman Jasim Abu Ghaith, Osama Bin Laden's son-in-law had been apprehended in Jordan and was slated to stand trial in federal court in New York City. Representative Peter King (R) of New York praised the... MORE

The hostage crisis at the gas plant facilities near In Aménas, in southeastern Algeria, ended on Thursday with major losses. Among the dozens of the dead or injured were Western as well as local Algerian workers, Islamist kidnappers and Algerian troops.  It may still be... MORE

As the Algerian government continues to control a haphazard and inconsistent flow of information from In Aménas, the site of this week’s dramatic hostage-taking by Islamist militants, there continues to be confusion over the number of hostages killed in an assault by Algerian security forces... MORE

Summary Clashes between Kurdish militias and armed Syrian opposition groups in Aleppo starting at the end of October in Ras al-Ayn near the Turkish border have raised the specter of a possible Arab-Kurdish civil war in Syria. An Arab-Kurdish civil war would weaken the efforts... MORE

A raid by Egyptian security forces in a suburb of Cairo on October 24 revealed an unexpected intersection of several important threads in the evolving security situation in the Middle East, including a possible revival of domestic terrorism in Egypt, the attacks on U.S. diplomatic... MORE

On November 15, China announced the seven members of the Political Bureau Standing Committee of the 18th Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Central Committee. These seven members, led by CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping, will form China’s supreme ruling council for the next five years. The... MORE

This year, the anniversary of the al-Qaeda 9/11 attacks on the United States was marred by a series of demonstrations against American diplomatic missions, beginning in Egypt and quickly spreading to Libya, ultimately covering a band of Muslim communities from the United Kingdom to Australia.... MORE

Executive Summary  While the Romanian state has been struggling with a constitutional crisis pitting President Traian Basescu against the Social-Liberal Union (SLU) government of Victor Ponta, the Kremlin mouthpiece Voice of Russia has increasingly been instigating and drawing out the conflict. President Basescu survived the... MORE

Executive Summary Abu Yahya al-Libi, purported to be killed in a drone strike, proves a heavy loss to al-Qaeda leadership. A charismatic leader and Ayman al-Zawahiri’s number two, al-Libi was seen as the successor to al-Zawahiri. Al-Libi was a part of the core group of... MORE

Executive Summary In March 2011, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula’s (AQAP) newly-formed subsidiary Ansar al-Shari’a quietly captured the southern Yemeni town of Jaar, while popular protests engulfed President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s splintering government and military in Sana’a. By the time Saleh’s replacement, Vice President Abd... MORE

After the Peruvian army captured Comrade Artemio on February 12 and two potential successors on March 4 and April 3, President Ollanta Humala declared that the Shining Path was “totally defeated”—a prediction that is already proving to be premature. The Shining Path faction in the... MORE

Executive Summary: On March 21, 2012, a group of Army mutineers appeared on  Mali's national television station to declare that they had ended President Amadou Toumani Toure's regime and put in place the "National Committee for Redressment of Democracy and Restoration of the State" (CNRDR).... MORE

Executive Summary: A year after the eruption of Libya’s spontaneous revolution, there are few signs of progress towards establishing internal security or a democratic government. Real power lies in the hands of well-armed militias with little inclination to disarm or demobilize and the ruling Transitional... MORE

Executive Summary:  A year after the eruption of Libya’s spontaneous revolution, there are few signs of progress towards establishing internal security or a democratic government. Real power lies in the hands of well-armed militias with little inclination to disarm or demobilize and the ruling Transitional... MORE

Executive Summary: In an effort to oust Qaddafi, independent militias of varying strength have been formed inside Libya and are threatening regional security inside the country. Of these the Zintan militia is one of the foremost examples of a brigade with strong organizational skills, effective... MORE

Executive Summary Hundreds of people have been arrested all around Iraq in an operation launched by the security forces against members of the banned Ba’ath party. The crackdown came a few days after U.S. President Barack Obama announced that U. S. forces will pull out... MORE

Executive Summary: In the absence of police and government security forces, al-Qaeda-sympathetic movements, including al-Shabaab al-Islam (The Youth of Islam), have formed in the Sinai Peninsula. The demands of these Salafi-Jihadist groups reflect both local and regional concerns. Among their demands are calls for a... MORE

Executive Summary:Bashar al-Assad’s Baathist regime, once considered the Middle East region’s most secure, is showing signs of vulnerability in the wake of the Syria uprisings. Al-Assad’s violent crackdown in recent weeks has emboldened his opponents and driven them to demand that he step aside. While... MORE

Executive Summary: Now raging into its fifth month, the Libyan revolution is spreading to more and more parts of the country, with smaller, more regionally autonomous battles with the Qaddafi regime coming to the fore as the rebels seek to develop a unified command. The... MORE

In the early hours of Saturday, March 12, Yemeni security forces under the direction of Yemen’s Central Security Service (CSS) (which is commanded by Yahya Salih and is home to the U.S. funded and trained “counter-terror unit”) stormed the anti-government protesters’ camp near Sana’a University.... MORE

On February 28, Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Salih announced his offer to form a national unity government that would be composed of members from all of Yemen’s opposition parties. The offer was quickly rejected by most members of the coalition of opposition parties, the Joint... MORE

After a two-month Saudi military offensive along the Saudi Arabia-Yemen border, the Houthist rebels of northern Yemen appear ready to abandon their brief occupation of small areas of Saudi Arabia’s Jizan province. In an audiotape message, the leader of Yemen’s Zaydi Shiite rebels, Abdul-Malik al-Houthi,... MORE