Category Archives: International Order and New Paradigm

Militarizing the Warming Arctic – The Race to Neo-Mercantilism(s)

The warming Arctic is the stage of an ongoing maritime, geopolitical and geo-economic revolution.

For example, end of August 2018, the Danish Maersk Company, one of the major ship owners in the world and the world’s largest container shipping company by both fleet size and cargo capacity, sent a first container ship using this route, in order to test its commercial use. The ship went from Vladivostok to Saint Petersburg, through the Bering Strait, following the northern coast of Siberia (Tom Embury-Morris, “Container Ship Crosses Arctic Route for First Time in History Due to Melting Sea Ice”, The Independent, 18 September, 2018).

Since 2013, each year, the number the number of Chinese cargo convoys using the Russian Northern Sea Route, also known as the North East passage, increases thanks to the rapid warming of the region, which transforms

The Khashoggi’s Mystery and the Need for a Wake Up Call – The Red (Team) Analysis Weekly – 25 October 2018

Each week our scan collects weak – and less weak – signals for global changes, national and international security, political and geopolitical risk of interest to private and public actors.

Editorial:  The New York Times’ article “Why Jamal Khashoggi’s Killing Has Resonated” by Megan Specia ponders what many have been wondering lately. Why on earth would the murder of Mr Kashoggi, definitely an atrocious crime, definitely terrible for his family and definitely wrong, yet an event that hardly obviously belongs to international relations and even less to major historical events, take center stage not only in the media but also for international actors be they public or private?

Signal: China – France Strengthening Relations

Impacts and Consequences Increased likelihood to see a return to a more influential and independent foreign policy of the European states holders of veto power at UN Security Council (France and UK); Increased likelihood to see a multipolar world settling in, however with also an Increased likelihood to see a global perception of a rising …

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Signals: Jerusalem – The U.S. Defeated at the U.N., China Seeks Advantage?

Impacts and Consequences Increased likelihood to see a global perception of the global U.S. influence and power lowered; Increased likelihood to see a global perception of the regional (Middle East) U.S. influence and power lowered. Should China step in successfully as peace broker between Israelis and Palestinians Increased likelihood to see global perception of a …

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Artificial Intelligence and Deep Learning – The New AI-World in the Making

This article focuses on Deep Learning, the sub-field of Artificial Intelligence that leads the current exponential development of the sector. As we seek to envision how a future AI-powered world will look and what it will mean to its actors, notably in terms of politics and geopolitics, it is indeed fundamental to first understand what is AI.
We shall first give examples of how Deep Learning is used in the real world. We distinguish two types of activities: classical AI-powered activities and totally new AI-activities, related to the very emergence of DL. In both cases we shall point out their revolutionary potential.
Then, we shall take a deeper dive in the world of Deep Learning, taking as practical example the evolution of Google’s DeepMind AI-DL program initially developed to win against human Go masters: AlphaGo, then AlphaGo Zero and finally AlphaZero. After briefly presenting where DL is located within AI, we shall focus first on Deep Neural Networks and Supervised Learning. Second we shall look at the latest evolution with Deep Reinforcement Learning and start wondering if a new AI-DL paradigm, which could revolutionise the current dogma regarding the importance of Big Data, is not emerging.

Signal: Google Opens Google AI China Center and Chinese Reactions

Impacts and Consequences Resulting from the Google AI China Center’s opening and then operations, we estimate rising likelihoods to see : Redrawing of the power map of the world along AI-power status lines Rising competition regarding AI between U.S. and Chinese mammoth Companies Human talents as stake in rising AI competition “Forced” introduction of “open …

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When Artificial Intelligence will Power Geopolitics – Presenting AI

“Killer Robots” worry the international community. From 13 to 17 November 2017, the Group of Governmental Experts on Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems (LAWS), also familiarly designed as “killer robots” met for the first time in Geneva (UN Office at Geneva). LAWS are, broadly speaking, autonomous systems (robots) animated by artificial intelligence, which can kill without …

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Signals: Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Israel…

Impact on Issues and Uncertainties ? Unity of Arab States, willingness and capability to support Saudi Arabia, willingness and capability to counter growing Iranian influence, (critical uncertainties) ➚ (➃ conflict in Yemen) Saudi perception of Iranian expansion and resulting threat ➙ ? Lebanon destabilisation ➚  ? Hezbollah influence in Lebanon ➚➚ Iran actualization of the Shia crescent to the Mediterranean …

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Signal: Al Qaeda / Islamic State New Front In Western Egypt?

Impact on Issues and Uncertainties ➚ ➃  Reinforced jihadist front in Western Egypt ➚ ➃ Challenges to Egypt as it is squeezed between the Sinai and Western fronts ➚ ➄ Survival of the Islamic State ➚ ➄ Islamic State resurgence in the MENA region, notably Libya ➚ ➄ Strengthening of al-Qaeda in the MENA region ➚ ➄ Reinforced linkages with other jihadist groups and …

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The Paradox of U.S. Decline … and the Tensions with North Korea

This article stresses the paradoxical character of a U.S. decline, and addresses the impossibility for the U.S. to accept its demise as superpower. It applies this framework to the case of the 2017 tensions with North Korea, and deduces a possible future path for the U.S. course of action, as well as possible levers regarding …

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