In the recent weeks, Russia has been remarkably self-assertive, suspending its participation in the CFE Treaty and sinking its flag in the North Pole, staging large-scale strategic exercises and putting gas pressure on Belarus. In the Middle East, however, Moscow has preferred to keep a low profile at a time when multiple parties to the [...]

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Israeli media reported on Monday that Syria has acquired an array of advanced Russian-made anti-aircraft missiles as part of a military build-up ahead of a possible war. Syria currently has “the densest anti-aircraft deployment in the world,” Israel’s mass-selling Yediot Aharonot daily quoted a military source as saying.
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In one crucial sense, the bear never went away. Although Russia’s navy has been rusting in dock for more than a decade, and though its army has shrunk in size and very nearly collapsed in morale after its setbacks in the Chechen wars, the nuclear-armed strategic rocket forces have retained much of their traditional power [...]

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Hezbollah is purchasing large plots of land from Christians and Druze in southern Lebanon to improve its military capabilities in preparation for another war with Israel, the British newspaper The Sunday Telegraph reported yesterday.
The paper said that Hezbollah was buying land north of the Litani River, where its operatives are undisturbed by the Lebanese Army [...]

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According to intelligence reports, Syria is building up an arsenal of missiles that are capable of carrying biological and chemical warheads to Tel Aviv and other major population centers. However Defense Minister Ehud Barak has said that he will not order the distribution of gas masks, Army radio reported on Monday.
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IDF: Syria’s antiaircraft system [...]

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What is the significance of “Peace Mission 2007″ - the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) exercise now under way at the Chebarkulsk training ground in Chelyabinsk, Russia - and the summit that will follow in Bishkek?
Is the SCO, which consists of China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, on the verge of being transformed into a [...]

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Still, it is not clear why the SCO’s founding document needs to be revised and which new members will be added to it and why.
These aforementioned points illustrate the dilemma facing observers of the SCO. On the one hand its members, particularly Russia and China, call it a significant new departure in world politics and [...]

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Venezuela is among a small but growing number of resource-rich countries to put the squeeze on international corporations. Russia early this year pressed both BP and Shell (Guardian) into turning over majority stakes in Russian gas operations to state-owned Gazprom. Bolivia nationalized gas and oil fields (NPR), and Ecuador used troops (Forbes) to take over [...]

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When terrorists tried shooting mortar rounds at Balad Air Base in July, they didn’t count on the tireless, unblinking eye of an MQ-1 Predator unmanned aerial vehicle overhead, transmitting their every move to airmen on the ground here. Airmen assigned to the 46th Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron here kept the Predator overhead July 24 watching [...]

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With the political opposition calling for his resignation, and Islamic radicals after his head, Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf has been toying with the idea of declaring a state of emergency to quell rising unrest. German editorialists wonder how that will help cure the country’s ills. more…

Author Ahmed Rashid on Pakistan’s Crisis: ‘The Umbilical Cord between [...]

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Unless you’ve been sleeping for the past five years, you are aware of Russia’s aggression under Vladimir Putin, whose objective may be only to return to the USSR a domestic model more familiar to him. FSM Contributing Editor Jonathan Strong reveals a more dangerous scenario.
Although Russian influence in the world has declined since the fall [...]

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The rise of Russia, China and the Islamist states, along with their control of energy resources and the growth of Sovereign Wealth Funds, leaves future dominance by a liberal democracy such as America, in grave doubt. FSM Contributing Editor David Jonsson explains why.
Liberal democracy, led by the United States may have emerged triumphant from [...]

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