At the time of writing, Ukrainian forces had managed to reach the so-called “Surovikin Line” in a number of places. Ukrainian units finally managed to break through the Russian echeloned defensive lines in the area of Priyutnoye-Staromayorskoye-Novodonetske and now threaten to enter the operational zone... MORE

*Read Part One. Just as it eschewed declaring war on Ukraine—proclaiming, instead, a “special military operation”—Russia never officially announced a naval blockade of Ukraine. A declared blockade accompanying a declared state of war would have enabled Russia to, however abusively, stop and search any commercial... MORE

According to recent leaks, Russian national defense spending surpassed 5.59 trillion rubles (more than $72.2 billion) for the first six months of 2023. The overall annual budget for the year was originally planned for 5.1 trillion rubles, or $74.7 billion according to the estimated exchange... MORE

The low-profile and high-impact meeting in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, on August 5 and 6 was never intended to produce a road map for ending the war in Ukraine; neither was it a summit, since the invitations sent to some 40 countries specified the level of... MORE

Executive Summary Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) constitute a rather important, yet relatively new, area for Chinese interests. Beijing’s strategy in dealing with countries that comprise the macro-region (South and Central America) is primarily driven by economic and business interests, as well as trade... MORE

Introduction In July, the US Ohio-class ballistic-missile submarine (SSBN) visited South Korea for the first time since 1981. Not one, but two of the 560-foot-long warships—which carried a payload of 24 long-range Trident ballistic missiles—surfaced in South Korean waters (Korea JoongAn Daily, July 24, 2023).... MORE

Women have played multifaceted roles in terrorist organizations since the advent of modern terrorism. The militant landscape of Pakistan is no different. In the recent past, Islamist terrorist organizations, such as Islamic State in Khorasan Province (ISKP), have fielded women in terrorist attacks in Pakistan... MORE

There are numerous jihadist groups in Syria, some of which host or are comprised of foreign fighters from Russia and Central Asia among their ranks. Many fighters from Russia and Central Asia chose the Syrian Civil War as their theater of operations around 2012, and... MORE

US Central Command (CENTCOM) issued a statement on July 9 to announce that it killed an Islamic State (IS) leader in eastern Syria two days earlier. This leader, Usama al-Muhajir, [1] was killed in an air strike conducted by an MQ9 drone (centcom.mil, July 9).... MORE

Transnistria has almost always attracted more attention as a tool for Moscow in limiting Moldova’s freedom of action than Gagauzia, a Turkic but Orthodox Christian autonomy in the country’s southeast that the Russian authorities have also used to influence Chisinau’s decision-making (see EDM, June 23,... MORE