The Syrian civil war allowed the Kurds to form a semi-independent Democratic Federation of Northern Syria, also known as Rojava, dominated by the Democratic Union Party (PYD) and its affiliated militia—the People’s Protection Units (YPG). In 2012, forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad withdrew... MORE

A great deal of recent commentary has alerted Western audiences to the threat posed by Russian spy ships and submarines in the North Atlantic. These vessels are conducting reconnaissance of United States naval bases and particularly of the trans-oceanic cables that bind together the US... MORE

The President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev recently described 2017 as a year of recovery from the economic crisis for his country (President.az, January 10). Yet, at the same time, Azerbaijan, along with the other states of the South Caucasus, Georgia and Armenia, spent the past... MORE

In the last five years, Russia has increased its underwater activity four to five times (Redstar.ru, November 8, 2017). Thirteen new Russian nuclear and conventional submarines have been commissioned since 2014 (24tv.ua, December 27, 2017). These vessels are capable of carrying out various offensive and... MORE

Technological breakthroughs in Russian military aviation and the expansion of a Russian airbase in Kaliningrad mean that the opening of a Russian military airfield in Belarus would do less for Russia’s defense posture than many had thought only a few years ago. At the same... MORE

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov declared at last week’s (January 18) special meeting of the United Nations Security Council that Russia had no intention of joining the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (a.k.a. the Nuclear Weapon Ban Treaty—NWBT). In his opinion, the NWBT... MORE

The Minister of Defense Industry of Azerbaijan Yavar Jamalov held a press conference, on December 17, to discuss the outcomes of 2017 for the country’s defense industry sector. The minister pointed out that this past year, two additional military-production factories were built in Azerbaijan. Thus,... MORE

In the four years that have passed since Russia annexed Crimea, the number of Russian submarines active in the Black Sea has grown from one to seven. These submarines pose a grave threat to the security of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) eastern flank.... MORE

The biggest success for all three Baltic countries—Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia—last year was the arrival of the multinational battalion groups to the region, thus implementing the decisions reached at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) 2016 summit in Warsaw (see EDM, February 23, 2017). Furthermore,... MORE

Vladimir Putin talks boldly about expanding the Russian military and especially the Russian fleet, but any expansion of the latter is, at best, many years away. Not only does it simply take a long time to build and launch new ships, but the largest planned... MORE