Asia

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Kate Duguid at Reuters reports the alarm at UBS that China’s new oil futures exchange will hurt the standing of the dollar as the world’s reserve currency. That development in turn would start the reverse snowball down the hill, with the dollar falling against other currencies, […]

Afghanistan

Afghanistan: How a Shrine Bombing in Kabul tells us Trump’s Surge won’t Succeed

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – This year, the merriment of Now-Ruz in Kabul was marred by a suicide bombing that killed at least 33 persons and wounded 68, according to the Afghani Ministry of Health. The perpetrator was allegedly a member of ISIL (which really needs another name, since it isn’t […]

Afghanistan

Despite Trump Surge, Taliban Attack Afghan Army Post, Killing 18 Soldiers

contributors

TeleSur | – – A bomb attack also took place in the capital Kabul killing at least one person. Islamic State group in Afghanistan claimed responsibility. Taliban militants have attacked an Afghan army post and killed 18 government soldiers, the defense ministry said Saturday, while a suicide bomber in the capital killed one person and […]

Buddhism

Buddhist Burma Bulldozing Muslim Rohingya Villages: Satellite Photos

contributors

TeleSur | – – Human rights groups that fear the Burmese government is destroying crime scenes before any credible investigation takes place. Satellite imagery shows at least 28 Rohingya villages have been leveled between December and February. However, reports produced by some human rights groups place the figure at 55. Myanmar’s military, aided by Buddhist […]

Afghanistan

Did the Pentagon’s War on Drugs Confound Counter-Terrorism?

contributors

By Nick Turse | (Tomdispatch.com) | – – 2017 was a year of investigations for U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM). There was the investigation of the two-star commander of U.S. Army Africa who allegedly sent racy texts to an enlisted man’s wife. There was the investigation into the alleged killing of a Special Forces soldier by […]

China

How Trump’s Erratic Isolationism is Helping China Rise

Juan Cole

By Dilip Hiro | ( Tomdispatch.com) | – – In his State of the Union address, Donald Trump warned grimly of “rivals like China and Russia that challenge our interests, our economy, and our values.” In response, he demanded that Congress give even more money to “our great military” and fund the growth and modernization […]

Colonialism

British Empire’s hidden workings in India and Iran revealed in remarkable new film footage

contributors

By Jonathan Westaway | The Conversation | – – In a basement office at the Royal Geographical Society in London’s South Kensington, grainy 16mm film footage flickers silently across the screen, one of over a hundred expeditionary and travel films digitised recently by the society and the British Film Institute. They are now free to […]

Afghanistan

US Pentagon will Keep fighting in Syria until they win the Vietnam War

contributors

By Danny Sjursen | ( Tomdispatch.com) | – – Vietnam: it’s always there. Looming in the past, informing American futures. A 50-year-old war, once labeled the longest in our history, is still alive and well and still being refought by one group of Americans: the military high command. And almost half a century later, they’re […]

Afghanistan

Afghanistan: Taliban Massacres nearly 100, wounds150 in Kabul

contributors

TeleSur | – – The explosion took place in an area near many embassies and government buildings. A bomb hidden in an ambulance killed at least 40 people and wounded about 140 at a police checkpoint in the Afghan capital Kabul Saturday, in an area near foreign embassies and government buildings, officials said. The Taliban […]