Indian Strategic Studies

5 May 2026

India’s Demographic Dividend Is a Test of Governance

Apoorva Jadhav

The demographic dividend is the potential economic growth a country can enjoy as a result of shifts in its population’s age structure. India often finds itself at the center of discussions about this concept. Much of the contemporary discourse around India’s rise as a major global economic power rests on the assumption that a youthful population will translate into sustained economic growth. The logic is straightforward: a smaller share of dependents (in India’s case, mostly children) relative to the working age population enables greater investment per child, particularly in healthcare, nutrition, education, and skills. Better-equipped workers are, in turn, more productive, boosting per capita income. In addition, women are more likely to enter the labor force, raising household incomes and overall growth.

For many decades, optimism about India’s demographic boon was well-founded. But that optimism is now under strain. There is a growing realization, supported by a mounting body of research, that reaping the demographic dividend depends on a conducive policy environment that prioritizes good healthcare, quality education, decent employment opportunities, and gender empowerment.

The Indus Waters Treaty: A Year After The Pahalgam Terror Attack – Analysis

Dr Amit Ranjan

A year after the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) was placed in “abeyance” by India following the Pahalgam terror attack in April 2025 which killed 26 people, New Delhi and Islamabad continue to hold divergent interpretations of the agreement. For India, the treaty remains in abeyance; for Pakistan, it is still “fully operational and effective”.

On 30 January 2026, speaking at an ‘Arria-formula’ meeting of the United Nations (UN) Security Council, Pakistan’s Permanent Representative to the UN, Ambassador Asim Iftikhar Ahmad, stated that India’s position on the IWT constitutes “a serious violation of international legal obligations, with far-reaching humanitarian, environmental, and peace and security implications”. In turn, India reiterated its stand that water issues cannot be insulated from cross-border terrorism.

How the Dreams of Bangladesh’s Student Protestors Died Young

Aaisha Sabir

When Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina fled to India on August 5, 2024, Dhaka’s streets filled with ordinary young people, students mostly, but also workers and families. These were people who, after weeks of protesting against Hasina’s authoritarian rule, did not want just one political party to replace another. They didn’t want a new leader doing the same old things. They had stopped accepting corrupt governance. They wanted something entirely different. What they wanted was something more fundamental: the freedom to speak without fear, jobs based on merit and talent rather than a reserved quota system, and a government that could actually be held accountable.

Eighteen months later, in April this year, I returned to Dhaka to look for those youngsters who had brought down the Hasina regime. I tracked down the students who had organized the protests, who faced police bullets, lathi (baton) charges, and tear gas.

Afghanistan Surrending Its Mineral Wealth to China

Javed Noorani , Lynne O'Donnell

Afghanistan is giving away its mineral wealth. Through a pattern of deals that export value at the point of extraction, the country is surrendering control over what could – and should – be its greatest hope for a stable and prosperous future.

This is not accidental. Nor is it the inevitable result of geography, decades of war, or even the nature of Taliban rule. It is the outcome of contracts that prioritise immediate cash over long-term management. Raw ore is being shipped out as Afghanistan signs away its most valuable assets on terms that lock in its own irrelevance.

Middle East Crisis As Catalyst: Pakistan In The Shadow Of Sino-US Competition – OpEd

Dr. Sujit Kumar Datta

The recent Middle East crisis has highlighted the region’s security instability, but also the opportunity for middle powers to play a role. In this respect, Pakistan is an interesting case, as it sits in between the new Cold War between China and the US, and can play the game. Crises are not only a time bomb for the region, but also an opportunity to boost Pakistan’s position and prove its diplomatic, domestic, and geopolitical agility.

Pakistani foreign policy has always been a juggle. It is, of course, China’s “all-weather” ally, with strong economic, military, and infrastructural ties, such as the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). It is a new – but also renewed – friend of the US, particularly in the areas of security and terrorism. This is Pakistan’s greatest wartime weapon. The Middle East conflagration the US and Iran have given Pakistan an opportunity for “mediation diplomacy”. Pakistan’s geopolitical and geo-strategic position vis-à-vis Iran and Saudi Arabia makes the situation interesting. It has an open and disputed border with Iran and a military alliance with Saudi Arabia. It is a sensitive time for diplomacy and restraint.

Pakistan Moves Toward a Sea-Denial Strategy

Abdul Moiz Khan

The Pakistan Navy has recently undertaken a series of missile tests from different platforms to augment its operational strike capabilities. These latest developments include the testing of an indigenously developed anti-ship version of the Taimoor air-launched cruise missile (ALCM), an indigenously developed ship-launched anti-ship ballistic missile (ASBM), and the LY-80 (N) surface-to-air missile (SAM) system. These capabilities point toward the operationalization of the Pakistan Navy’s sea-denial naval strategy – one that prioritizes precision strike capabilities. The goal is to neutralize an adversary fleet’s capabilities to impose a naval blockade while keeping enemy vessels far away from Pakistan’s waters.

On April 21, Pakistan Navy tested the Taimoor ALCM, capable of striking targets at a range of 600 km. The missile has been described as a precision-strike, stand-off weapon system that is capable of engaging targets at both land and sea. The new weapon system provides the Pakistan Navy with an air-launched anti-ship strike capability, in addition to the existing ship-launched and submarine-launched anti-ship missiles. The induction of this latest stand-off weapon would increase Islamabad’s operational flexibility, and enable it to strike the Indian naval fleet at extended ranges.

A Legacy of Duplicity: Tracing Pakistan’s Double Cross From 9/11 to the Trump Era

For decades, the geopolitical alliance between the United States and Pakistan has been characterized by a profound and dangerous paradox: a public marriage of strategic necessity masking a private reality of calculated betrayal. This complex dynamic traces its roots to the 1980s, when Washington and Islamabad collaborated to arm the Mujahideen against the Soviet Union, effectively institutionalizing terrorist proxies as a lethal extension of Pakistani foreign policy. This analysis covers Pakistan’s double cross of United States after 9/11 where it has regularly abetted terrorist groups networks from Al Qaeda to other terrorist groups against India committing one of the most dastardly attacks on Mumbai 26/11 in the year 2008.

The historical timeline of events of Pakistan’s double cross, details of its sponsorship of terrorism from 9/11 to 26/11 attacks (2001-08) in Part 1 to 9 this article are based on the groundbreaking investigative reporting of the late Syed Saleem Shahzad. His seminal 2011 book, “Inside Al-Qaeda and the Taliban: Beyond Bin Laden and 9/11”, remains an indispensable primary source for understanding of Pakistan’s double cross and sponsorship of terrorism as an instrument of state policy.

Energy Dominance: How the Iran War Reveals America’s Strategic Position

Arthur Michelino

The Strait of Hormuz is the point at which approximately one fifth of the world’s traded oil passes through a corridor 21 nautical miles wide, flanked on one side by Iran and the other by Oman. For 70 years, the implicit guarantee that this passage would remain open rested on a single assumption, namely that the United States had both the interest and the willingness to maintain it. The Iran war has exposed what this assumption had long kept from view, that Washington’s willingness to maintain the guarantee has always been contingent on its own stake in the system it is guaranteeing.

On 20 April, Trump posted that Iranian leadership had “forced hundreds of Ships toward the United States, mostly Texas, Louisiana, and Alaska, to get their Oil.” The formulation is analytically significant beyond its rhetorical register. It frames the near closure of a critical energy chokepoint as a condition generating commercial advantage for US producers, one whose resolution is incidental to that advantage. The structural question that formulation raises is how Washington arrived at a position where the disruption of a waterway carrying one fifth of global oil trade could be read as an outcome consistent with its strategic interests. The answer lies in the doctrine that preceded the war, not in the war itself.

How Iran’s Regime Stays in Control

Ilan Berman

In the conversation about Iran’s future, it’s the dog that isn’t barking. More than two months into the US conflict with the Islamic Republic, Operation Epic Fury didn’t deliver the regime change in Tehran that many initially anticipated. While there are growing signs that the country has transitioned into something that, despite theocratic window-dressing, closely resembles a military dictatorship, it’s also apparent that Washington hasn’t achieved a fundamental change in its behavior—at least not yet.

All eyes are now understandably on the sporadic diplomatic contacts between Washington and Tehran, as well as the punishing economic effects of the US blockade, which is already reshaping Iran’s oil sector. But the internal political balance in Iran may prove even more decisive, as it will help determine whether the regime’s remaining leadership can maintain its grip on power.

The Permanent Emergency – OpEd

Claudio Grass

Unlike the centuries that came before it, full of great and truly important ideological and philosophical clashes, full of historical shifts in the trajectory of Western thought, values identity and culture, the story of our time will most likely not feature any grand battles of ideas or any defining crescendos that will captivate the imagination and inspire future students of history. It will be written in a dry, bureaucratic language and it simply consist of a series of “temporary” emergency measures. This is how our remaining liberties and with them, our Western civilization, will end: “not with a bang, but with a whimper”, as T.S. Elliot would put it.

To the casual observer, the shift toward authoritarianism in the Western world feels like a series of unfortunate accidents. A pandemic here, an unnecessary war with Russia there, a geopolitical energy crisis after that. But to those who maintain a healthy skepticism of state power, a much more deliberate pattern emerges.

Daily Memo: RIMPAC Preview, Israeli Pessimism

Major Pacific exercise. A record number of countries, 31, will participate in this year’s U.S.-led Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) naval exercise. The five-week drill near the Hawaiian Islands will begin June 24 and feature more than 25,000 personnel, approximately 40 ships, five submarines and 140 aircraft. The full list of participating countries is unknown.

Winning the Institutional Battlefield

Sue Ghosh Stricklett

The United States is pursuing reform at the United Nations, and its myriad affiliated agencies at a moment when competition inside it is intensifying. These reforms can change how the system operates—but not necessarily who shapes its outcomes.

Two decades of inconsistent U.S. engagement have created space for China’s growing influence across global multilateral institutions. That influence is not incidental. It reflects a sustained Chinese strategy of coalition-building, narrative shaping, and institutional positioning that converts presence into power. Nowhere is this more consequential than within the United Nations, where reform and geopolitical competition are now inseparable.

Bleak Future For Multilateralism – Analysis

P. K. Balachandran

In recent times, one has been seeing international associations (a few of them deemed to be “iron clad”) cracking up or showing internal strains that could result in their dissolution. At the same time, there appears to be an increasing tendency among countries to opt out of multilateral treaties and go in for more suitable and better tailored bilateral arrangements.

The future of organizations like SAARC, NATO, OPEC, BRICS, SCO, BIMSTEC and RECP is bleak.

The case of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) comes to mind immediately. The Cold War vintage NATO has seen unprecedented strain in the last couple of months over US President Donald Trump’s unilateral war against Iran. Its fulcrum, the United States, had threatened to quit it after its European members refused to help President Trump forcibly open the Strait of Hormuz.

North Korea’s Nuclear Weapons And Missile Programs – Analysis

Mary Beth D. Nikitin

Over the past decade, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK, or North Korea) has advanced its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs, which has raised the threat Pyongyang poses to the U.S. homeland, U.S. allies in East Asia, and U.S. interests. In April 2026, a U.S. defense official testified that “North Korea’s nuclear forces are increasingly capable of targeting the U.S. Homeland, and its missile forces can strike South Korea and Japan with nuclear or conventional warheads.” The 2026 National Defense Strategy stated that these forces are “growing in size and sophistication, and they present a clear and present danger of nuclear attack on the American Homeland.”

U.S. policies and multiple UN Security Council (UNSC) resolutions have imposed sanctions and called on North Korea to eliminate its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs in a “complete, verifiable and irreversible manner.” Since 2022, Russian and Chinese policies toward North Korea have shifted. The U.S. Forces Korea commander said in April 2025 that in return for North Korea’s assistance in its war against Ukraine, “Russia is expanding sharing of space, nuclear, and missile-applicable technology, expertise, and materials to the DPRK.”

Stocks End April on a High, Even as Oil Prices Touch New Peak

Joe Rennison and Gregory Schmidt

The S&P 500 ended April at a fresh record high, with investors balancing concerns that the war in Iran could lead to longer disruption of fuel supplies from the Middle East against strong corporate earnings and data showing continued economic growth.

Investors were buoyed on Thursday after a report showed modest economic growth in the United States for the first three months of the year, boosted by investment in the infrastructure needed to power artificial intelligence.

The New Resource Curse

Rabah Arezki , Frederick van der Ploeg, Michael L. Ross

Shock waves from the war Israel and the United States launched against Iran at the end of February have sent oil prices skyrocketing—from $64 a barrel a year ago to $106 a barrel now. This episode joins a long list of embargoes, oil-price shocks, nationalization waves, and resource wars that have made petroleum the textbook case of commodity-driven instability. Yet the kinds of economic and geopolitical volatility that defined the oil age may well look minor compared with the turbulence the critical minerals era is poised to unleash.

Starting in the late nineteenth century, as the world industrialized and the internal combustion engine displaced coal and steam, access to petroleum became inseparable from national power. The emergence of critical minerals—cobalt, lithium, nickel, rare earths, and a dozen others essential to the energy transition, digital infrastructure, and advanced military systems—already bears some parallels to this history.

Oil price hits highest since 2022 after report Trump to be briefed on new Iran options

Osmond Chiaand

Oil prices jumped to their highest level since 2022 after a report that the US military is set to brief President Donald Trump on new plans for potential action in the Iran war. Brent crude rose by almost 7% to more than $126 (£94) a barrel at one point, before falling back.

US Central Command has prepared a plan for a wave of "short and powerful" strikes on Iran to try to break the deadlock in negotiations with Tehran, news site Axios reported. The BBC has contacted US Central Command and the White House for comment. Energy prices have been rising this week as peace talks appear to have stalled, with the key Strait of Hormuz waterway still effectively closed.

Turkey is Iran war’s biggest winner — without firing a shot

Leon Hadar

When US and Israeli aircraft struck Iran on February 28, killing Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and decapitating much of the senior Iranian leadership, Turkey’s reaction was striking for what it withheld. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan described the US-Israeli attacks on Iran as a blatant violation of international law, closed Turkish airspace to US forces and personally conveyed his condolences following the assassination of Khamenei.

At the same time, Ankara took care to distance itself from Tehran, openly criticizing Iran’s retaliatory strikes on Gulf states and blaming Iranian intransigence for the collapse of pre-war negotiations. The message was deliberate, and it has aged well: Turkey was against the war and was no one’s ally in it.

Are We Heading Toward World War III?

Francis P. Sempa

The Second World War was the most destructive conflict in human history. When it was over, some sixty million people were dead. It featured the mass bombing of cities and civilians, the torture and murder of prisoners of war, starvation, genocide, and the use of atomic weapons. The peace that ended the war was imperfect. Joseph Stalin’s Soviet Union, which helped start the European phase of the war, was one of the victors, and its totalitarian realm expanded. China’s civil war continued, resulting in Mao Zedong’s communist conquest of the mainland. World War II gave birth to the nuclear age and the Cold War, with all of its “smaller” wars and crises. Winston Churchill, who led Great Britain to victory in the war, wrote afterward that “there never was a war more easy to stop than that which has just wrecked what was left of the world from the previous struggle.” He called World War II the “unnecessary war.”

The world hedges its bets on America

Ian Bremmer

Since returning to the White House last January, Donald Trump has antagonized most of the world’s major governments in one form or another. In particular, he has targeted Iran, Venezuela, Cuba, most of Europe, Canada, and even Greenland for various forms of coercion, and his tariffs have set teeth on edge pretty much the world over. More importantly, the president has redefined what the global superpower will and will not do – and might redefine it all again sooner rather than later.

The result? When it comes to Washington, governments are hedging bets on the future of American power and what it might mean for them.

Some have more leverage than others to push back on Trump’s attempts at pressure. His interactions with those countries have often led to outcomes many call “TACO” – Trump Always Chickens Out. Those with less political and economic muscle cross the president at their peril. That’s the “FAFO” category – F Around and Find Out.

Missiles, Guns, Lasers . . . and Nets: The Case for Passive Drone Defenses

William Mayne

Of all of the modern war lessons that have emerged from more than four years of war in Ukraine, the rapid rise of weaponized drone technology and the necessary race to develop systems to counter them has arguably received the most attention—and the most resourcing by militaries around the world seeking to address it. Notable examples like fiber-optic drones, which are impervious to electronic warfare countermeasures, and Ukraine’s Operation Spiderweb, which used hidden drones to attack Russian strategic airfields, have exposed vulnerabilities to military forces operating from static, easy to identify locations.

For US forces, the lessons learned vicariously through the war in Ukraine are being reinforced by the combat operations in the Middle East they are now engaged in. The threat of weaponized drones is quickly shifting from academic to existential for units deployed within range of Iranian and Iranian-aligned militia groups’ one-way attack and first-person-view drones in the Middle East. Despite a major push by the US armed services into counterdrone improvement, a simple, low-tech solution is being overlooked: the antidrone net.

Germany slashes welfare state to fund rearmament

Antonio O'Mullony

Germany’s coalition government has agreed a sweeping package of welfare cuts worth €38.3 billion by 2030, stripping back the country’s health system and pension guarantees to free up funds for military spending.

The Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and Social Democratic Party (SPD) — which form the governing coalition under Chancellor Friedrich Merz — reached the agreement ahead of a cabinet meeting on April 28, 2026. German media obtained the document before the official announcement.

The most contentious measure removes free health insurance coverage for non-contributing spouses. Under the new rules, spouses who do not pay into the statutory system will be required to contribute a minimum of 2.5 per cent of their partner’s insured income.

Ukrainian Military Offers Lessons Learned To NATO (Part III) – Analysis

Dr. Taras Kuzio

Source Link

Russia’s war against Ukraine is demonstrating how new technologies are changing modern warfare. In March, Ukrainian Ambassador to the United Kingdom Valerii Zaluzhnyy wrote for The Telegraph that the United States and other North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) members need to better prepare for drone warfare (Telegraph, March 21). In June 2024, Ukraine created the first branch of its armed forces dedicated to drones, the Unmanned Systems Forces (Kyiv Independent .

Drone warfare leads to more lethal casualties and fewer wounded soldiers. Increasing and adapting medical services is essential for NATO in preparing for a potential future war. Evacuation of the wounded is more difficult when the sky is saturated with drones, putting medical troops at greater risk, so Ukrainians are using ground drones for evacuations (see EDM, January 26). Ukraine’s ground drones are increasing in importance and conducting 7,000 missions each month, mainly logistical functions and the evacuation of wounded (see EDM, January 26). Approximately 200 Ukrainian companies produce ground drones, with 162 models available for Ukrainian troops on the online Brave 1 platform.

India’s Demographic Dividend Is a Test of Governance

Source: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Author: Unknown

AI Executive Summary

India's potential demographic dividend is a test of governance. Its rise as a global economic power hinges on robust policy in healthcare, education, employment, and gender empowerment. Strategic planning is crucial to adapt institutions across demographic phases, leveraging state-level lessons to avoid stagnation and realize its growth potential.

Read the full article here.

Living Without an AI Kill Switch

Ngaire Woods

With the arrival of Anthropic’s scarily powerful Mythos model, the tech titans that have long argued against any kind of AI regulation are now clamoring for it. Governments should take immediate steps to coordinate effectively and enable rapid information sharing, while also compelling developers to meet basic safety standards.

OXFORD—It has long been clear that slow-moving governments are not keeping pace with rapid AI progress. But Anthropic’s announcement that its new Claude Mythos Preview model could identify and exploit vulnerabilities in every major operating system and web browser has underscored the perils of failing to regulate this technological revolution. Even enthusiastic deregulator US President Donald Trump conceded that there should be a “kill switch” when news about Mythos broke. But such a simple solution no longer exists—if it ever did.

AI nuclear decision making has a data problem

Ulysse Richard, Yorgo El Moubayed

Political and military leaders around the world are increasingly turning to artificial intelligence (AI) to improve the pace and quality of their decisions, including in scenarios that could lead to nuclear war. Their technical staff should be quick to raise a structural constraint: AI-enabled decision-support systems are only as good as the computer models they rely on, and, crucially, the data available to train those models. But gathering data for scenarios that must be avoided at all costs is no small task. Even if attempting to leverage AI systems for nuclear decision making is a worthwhile pursuit, who can teach the machine about nuclear war?

Not history. Only two nuclear weapons have ever been used in war. Serious crises involving nuclear weapons number perhaps several dozen over eight decades. There is near-zero real-world data from which a machine could learn to manage a nuclear standoff. And yet AI is already being woven into the systems that filter intelligence, characterize attacks, and shape the information reaching the people responsible for making launch decisions.

4 May 2026

Expanding Frontiers: China’s Military Push Beyond the First Island Chain

Joe Keary, Rajeswari Pillai Rajagopalan & Linus Cohen

China’s defence and security presence beyond the Western Pacific is set to intensify over the next decade, expanding its access, influence and operational reach across the Indo-Pacific.

In the Southwest Pacific, Beijing is likely to build its position through security cooperation, infrastructure development and a more regularised presence, while activity across the Indian Ocean and Australia’s maritime approaches is likely to become more frequent, capable and strategically purposeful.

We are not likely to see sudden military breakthroughs or dramatic shows of force. Rather, Beijing has a deliberate, long-term strategy – one that prioritises persistence and gradual advantage. China is seeking to normalise its presence across the Indo-Pacific in ways that expand its freedom of action, complicate the calculations of others and incrementally shift the strategic balance in its favour.

CNA Explains: Why the UAE is quitting OPEC – and what it means for oil markets

Firdaus Hamzah

SINGAPORE: The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) will have one fewer member from Friday (May 1) after the United Arab Emirates (UAE) announced its decision to leave the oil cartel.

The 65-year-old organisation produces about 40 per cent of the world’s crude oil and has long wielded significant influence over global energy prices. The UAE said it plans to continue pursuing its goal of gradually increasing crude production, in line with demand and market conditions.

The Oil Supply Shock Will Scar the World for Years

Tsvetana Paraskova

The Middle East’s oil production and the global economy will take months and even years to recover from the worst crude supply shock in history.

Two months after the U.S. and Israel bombed Iran on February 28, the Strait of Hormuz remains closed for most tanker traffic, forcing more than 10 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude output shut-ins across the Middle Eastern oil producers. The disrupted energy flows triggered a global race for alternative supply, and sent energy prices soaring with the prospect of slowing global economic growth and even leading to a global recession if the world’s most critical oil chokepoint stays mostly inaccessible for another three months.

The two-month-long closure of the Strait of Hormuz is longer than analysts had expected at the start of the war. Most assumed back then that the Strait would open by April and producers could restart shut-in wells in May.

Iran Already Scrambling For Oil Storage After Two Weeks Of US Blockade

Tyler Durden

Trump's blockade is having a predictable effect on Iran's economy and oil industry, with reports that the regime is scrambling to repurpose old and rusty tankers as floating storage. Kharg Island is hitting capacity and the results could lead to disaster for Iran's oil wells.

The regime is reportedly moving to expand crude storage at the island, where around 90% of their energy exports are processed, by reactivating a 30-year-old crude carrier called M/T Nasha. It's a bad sign for Iran, indicating that the country’s main oil hub is nearing its onshore storage limit. Maritime analysts say the vessel, which had been anchored empty for years, is being repositioned as floating storage to absorb crude that still has to move out of the system.

Keeping talks with US sputtering along, Iran may be looking for time, not a deal

Stav Levaton

The latest stutter steps to plague US-Iran talks — marked by cancellations and missed meetings in Pakistan — have sharpened a central question hanging over the high-stakes negotiation: Is this a temporary breakdown, or evidence that the two sides are not negotiating at the same table at all?

Plans for the sides to gather in Islamabad over the weekend fell apart on Saturday, with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi leaving Pakistan and US President Donald Trump telling his negotiators to turn back at the last second and describing the trip and the talks as a waste of time. This came after Tehran earlier rejected attending a planned second round of direct talks.

Trump’s $1.5 Trillion Defense Budget Request: Unhinged, Unaffordable, and Unnecessary

Steven Kosiak

The Trump administration’s 2027 budget request, submitted on April 3, calls for funding defense at $1.5 trillion. It is difficult to overstate just how massive an increase in defense spending this would represent — or how unhinged it seems to be from reality and sober policymaking.

The 2026 defense budget already included a $150 billion increase from 2025. The latest request would involve a further increase of some $450 billion, marking an increase in “real” terms (i.e., inflation-adjusted) of 40 percent from 2026, and a 58 percent increase from 2025. Moreover, it would establish a defense budget that is some 90 percent higher — again, in real terms — than both the peak of the Cold War and the average base defense budget of the past 25 years (see Figure 1). It is also important to understand that the administration’s request — like all base budget requests — is intended only to cover the Pentagon’s peacetime manning, operating, and modernization costs. It is in addition that the administration plans to request a further $200 billion to cover Iran war costs.

A New Era of U.S.-China Interaction: From Competing to Racing

Evan S. Medeiros

This essay examines the U.S.-China trade war in 2025 as a possible turning point in the U.S.-China competition, arguing that the trade war created new power dynamics around a supply chain race that centers on leveraging chokepoints in critical minerals and advanced technologies.

Note: The author would like to thank the following colleagues for their superior research assistance: Jessica Shao, Davis Di, and Henry Wessel. This is the final essay in a series of four essays in 2025–26 on trade policy made possible by the generous support of the Hinrich Foundation.

King gets ovation for Congress speech warning of volatile world

Sean Coughlan

King Charles stressed the value and importance of the "indispensable" UK and US partnership in a well-received speech to Congress in Washington DC. Speaking in the US Capitol, the King warned the two nations had to stand together in a "more volatile, more dangerous" era - and he delivered some hard truths about the need to back Nato.

"We meet in times of great uncertainty, in times of conflict from Europe to the Middle East which pose immense challenges," he told the chamber, filled with US lawmakers. It was the biggest diplomatic moment of his reign, against a backdrop of deepening political tensions between the US and the UK - and in the end, he got a standing ovation before he'd spoken.

BREAKING: Air Force Academy Female Insubordination Threatens Secretary Of War During Global Conflict - Former Superintendent Lt Gen Michelle Johnson Reportedly Leads Charge Against 'Old White Men' Recently Elected To USAFA AOG

L Todd Wood

CORRECTION: We initially wrote that Charlie Kirk was on the USAFA AOG Board of Directors. That was an oversight. It should have read the USAFA Board of Visitors and has been corrected.

In a flagrant display of insubordinate Marxist ideology, the U.S. Air Force Academy terrazzo was overun last Friday with hundreds of females from a USAFA affinity group for women that literally threatened the Secretary of War during the ongoing conflict in Iran.

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