Last fall, during the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) massive Trident Juncture 2018 military exercises, 31 allied and partner countries, over 50,000 personnel, 10,000 vehicles, 150 aircraft and some 60 warships, including the carrier USS Harry Truman, gathered to practice large-scale maneuvers in Norway as... MORE

The interregnum in Kyiv invites probing from Moscow. “Let us start from a clean slate. We are open to dialogue,” the Russian Federation Council’s (upper chamber of the Russian parliament) chair, Valentina Matvienko, signaled to Ukraine via state-owned news agency TASS, on May 29. “We... MORE

Introduction China established the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Strategic Support Force (SSF) (zhanlue zhiyuan budui, 战略支援部队) in late 2015 as part of a sweeping military reform that overhauled the PLA’s organizational structure, command and control systems, and operational paradigm. At its core, the reform aimed... MORE

Introduction—Japan Seeks “Networking” with Regional Allies In early May 2019, Japanese Foreign Minister (FM) Taro Kono tweeted support for Taiwan’s bid to attend the World Health Assembly as an observer—thereby advocating for Taiwan’s return to a status it previously held from 2009 until 2016, when... MORE

On May 9, a newly formed military-patriotic movement, Young Guard–Yunarmia, opened the Victory Day parade in Donetsk, the largest city in de facto occupied eastern Ukraine (Dan-news.info, May 9). Earlier, members of the movement took part in events dedicated to the 30th anniversary of the... MORE

Until the Russian Federation launched a barrage of cruise missiles against Syria from ships in the Caspian Sea in October 2015 (see EDM, October 26, 2015), few people in the West devoted much attention to Russia’s Caspian Flotilla, viewing it, if at all, as a... MORE

In key global debates, Russia’s voice has been uncharacteristically timid lately, and various Russian domestic controversies are developing without the usual heavy-handed interference from the Kremlin—almost as if President Vladimir Putin has lost interest in the affairs of state. Such local disturbances as protests in... MORE

“Getting Out From ‘In-Between’ ” was the suggestive title of a 2018 RAND Corporation study devoted to the former Soviet republics that became members of the European Union’s Eastern Partnership (EaP) initiative. The EaP just celebrated its tenth anniversary; and according to some not quite impartial... MORE

President Volodymyr Zelensky’s inaugural address to the country, delivered on May 20 in the Ukrainian parliament, includes an unprecedented offer to start a direct dialogue with the Kremlin (see EDM, May 22). Switching to Russian for this part of his speech, Zelensky made an opening... MORE

Volodymyr Zelensky was sworn in as Ukraine’s next president on May 20. The popular comedian won a landslide victory over the incumbent, Petro Poroshenko, by accumulating a critical mass of protest votes across the country. In his inaugural address, Zelensky disbanded the Verkhovna Rada (Ukrainian... MORE