From the War in Gaza to the Great U.S.-China War (2)?

(Art direction: Jean-Dominique Lavoix-Carli – design with DALL-E 2) Given the speed and political density of the historic sequence opened by the war in Gaza, the second article in this new RTAS series only covers the period from 27 October to 20 November 2023. In the first part of this series, we saw how the …

Using Videos for Scenarios: The Future Operational Environment 2035-2050

(Screenshot from the video FOE 2035-2050 Army Futures Command) Once valid scenarios for the future are built, we still need to deliver them to policy-makers and decision-makers. We need to understand the various challenges implied by the communication of strategic foresight products, and among them all the biases and traps that may hinder this communication, …

The war in Gaza and China’s pivot to the Middle East

(Art direction and design: Jean-Dominique Lavoix-Carli) Given the speed and political density of the historic sequence opened by the Gaza war, the first article in this new RTAS series covers only the period from 7 to 27 October 2023. Introduction: A new war in a new Middle East On 27 October 2023, Israel’s military launched …

China, Serbia, AI, and the Pincer Movement on Europe

(Art design: Jean-Dominique Lavoix-Carli) On 10 April 2022, six Chinese military heavy duty transport aircraft landed at Belgrade airport in Serbia. They were delivering the Chinese FK 3 export version of the HQ-22 surface-to-air weapons systems. This delivery deepens military ties between China and Serbia, following the delivery of 14 CH-92 combat drones in 2020 …

China, Saudi Arabia and the Arab AI Rise

(Art direction: Jean-Dominique Lavoix-Carli) On 7 December 2022, China’s president Xi Jinping received a royal welcome at his arrival in Saudi Arabia for a three days state visit. State visits between China and Saudi Arabia heads of state have taken place since 2016. In 2022, President Xi received a royal and considerably warmer welcome than …

Can You Unbias Analysis? The Russian Nuclear Threat

Starting in mid-September 2022, the Western media and political world has been abuzz with a Russian threat of nuclear Armageddon. Against such evil, the West, supporting Ukraine, may only show outrage, unveil the real malevolent nature of Russia and increase pressure to try to deter Russia, so runs the narrative. On 27 October 2022, reputable …

An Excluded Russia? Not for Asia – Anthropocene Wars (6)

(Art direction: Jean-Dominique Lavoix-Carli) From 1 September to 16 September 22, Vladimir Putin, President of the Federation of Russia, presided the Russian military exercises Vostok 2022. Besides the Russian military, the exercise gathered troops from 14 countries, including India and China (Arang Shidore, “Vostok military exercises indicate that Russia is far from isolated”, Responsible Statecraft, …

The War between China and the U.S. – The Normative Dimension

(Art design: Jean-Dominique Lavoix-Carli) The whole world is caught in a battle of giants with the U.S. on the one hand and China on the other. This confrontation takes place at different levels and through all forms and dimensions of power. The escalation towards war is at work. War is not inevitable, it is however …

The American National Interest

(Art design: Jean-Dominique Lavoix-Carli Do the United States still consider France to be their ally? We have to ponder this question because of the submarine contract signed between France and Australia, and broken in September 2021, to the benefit of the U.S.. If a country takes 35 billion euros from you, possibly revalued to 55 …

Understanding the War in Syria – 2013 to 2017/18

In the light of the sometimes relatively long updates being necessary to keep the series on Syria up to date, the whole section on Syria has been reorganized and a starting page for the series introduced. Updates up to October 2013 are being added in the meantime.

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