By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Saudi crown prince Muhammad bin Salman announced Friday that Saudi Arabia would use its oil assets to back a $2 trillion sovereign wealth fund. The move suggested to many observers that the kingdom is preparing for a likely end of the petroleum business and transitioning to […]
Turkey’s Erdogan exports Press crackdown to US as his guards manhandle Journalists in DC
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Turkish President Erdogan visited Washington DC this week to participate in the deliberations on nuclear weapons. He brought with him some bad habits and some bad actors in his security detail, according to WaPo’s Ishaan Tharoor. Some pro-Kurdish protesters gathered to protest Erdogan’s visit. Then when […]
Syria Endgame: Are Russia and US Planning overthrow of ISIL in al-Raqqa?
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – The Russian press had been complaining that the West was ignoring its defeat of terrorism in Syria. But now the Russian press is saying that the US and the Russian Federation are jointly planning to liberate the Syrian city of al-Raqqa, the capital of the phony […]
The Trump Doctrine: End NATO, Patrol Mosques, Nukes for Japan & Allies
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Anderson Cooper’s interview with Donald Trump on Tuesday evening had the advantage of allowing come-backs and close questioning. At one point Cooper pointed out to Trump that he sometimes behaved like a 5-year-old, as with his attacks on Heidi Cruz. At another, he wondered why Trump […]
After Brussels, the Strategy of ISIL/ Daesh
By Paul Rogers | (OpenDemocracy) | – – Tunisia, Paris, and now Brussels: escalating attacks on western targets reflect a shift of focus by ISIL. The security consultancy IHS Jane’s has just completed an assessment on the risk of an armed attack in Europe. Its report was published a few days before the assaults in […]
How Green Energy is already taking over the World
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – In 2015 energy companies invested more in new renewables power plants in 2015 than in fossil fuel plants for the first time in history. The majority of these plants were planned for the developing countries, which is a sign that the technology is viewed as now […]
Fall of Palmyra: Syrian regime races to take ISIL’s ‘Berlin’ and forestall ‘Partition’
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – That massive Russian air strikes and a determined infantry and armor assault by the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) on the ancient city of Palmyra could dislodge from it a few hundred or at most a couple thousand Daesh (ISIS, ISIL) fighters is not all that surprising. […]
What would effective Counter-Terrorism look like after Brussels?
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – The various nostrums proposed to counter Daesh (ISIL, ISIS) terrorism in Europe and North America by Donald Trump and Ted Cruz (armed patrols by police of putative “Muslim neighborhoods”, a Muslim exclusion act, etc.) are of course complete non-starters. So too are killing the children of […]
30 Americans die worldwide from Terrorism annually, while 130,000 die by accident
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – The right wing is carping that President Obama is “downplaying” the dangers of Daesh (ISIL, ISIS) in the wake of the Paris and Brussels attacks on soft targets. But whipping up hysteria about the threat of terrorism is a racket that mainly benefits security firms and […]
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