Indian Strategic Studies: 07/12/25

12 July 2025

India must upskill fast to keep up with AI jobs, says new report

Bijin Jose

As the world continues to embrace artificial intelligence (AI), India seems to be at a tipping point. A new report backed by Google.org and the Asian Development Bank has thrown light on the opportunities and challenges for one of the largest economies. Despite having the largest workforces in the world, India urgently needs to offer accessible and effective AI upskilling, according to the report ‘AI for All: Building an AI-ready Workforce in Asia-Pacific.’

The report states that AI will contribute up to USD 3 trillion to the GDP of the Asia-Pacific region by 2030. And, India, with its young and fastest-growing population, is key to this potential. The report, however, warns that the forces that could propel growth also come with the risk of widening the inequality. This is a likelihood if workers are left behind.

Further, the report revealed that administrative and support roles, such as data entry, scheduling, and customer service, are at risk considering the rapid advancement in AI-driven automation. According to the report, these roles are disproportionately performed by those from underserved communities, including women, informal workers, and those with low digital literacy. These groups contribute largely in sectors like manufacturing, textiles, and logistics. And, in the absence of focused AI skilling initiatives, these workers risk being left behind in the rapidly evolving job market.

“In countries like India, where a significant portion of the workforce is currently engaged in labor-intensive tasks such as labeling data and training AI systems, there’s a looming question about the future. As these processes become increasingly automated and sophisticated,

what opportunities will exist for millions of people whose livelihoods depend on these roles today? Without proactive planning for reskilling and creating pathways into higher-value AI and tech-related jobs, we risk leaving large parts of the population behind in the AI revolution,” said Kelly Forbes, President & Executive Director, AI Asia Pacific Institute, Asia Pacific.

How Indian Americans Live: Results From the 2024 Indian American Attitudes Survey

From the nightly news on television to the C-suite offices on Wall Street, and from Hollywood’s studio lots to the laboratories of America’s leading universities, Indian Americans are leaving their mark on America’s economic,

scientific, social, cultural, and political life. Numbering more than 5.2 million, Indian Americans now comprise the second-largest immigrant group in the United States by country of origin. But beyond the politicians, celebrities, CEOs, writers, and technology entrepreneurs, the social realities of everyday Indian Americans have received scant attention.

Depicting these realities is no easy task. Indian Americans are an extremely heterogeneous community, embodying much of the diversity that India itself possesses. The diaspora includes representatives of myriad faiths, caste identities, and the full spectrum of India’s geographic regions and subregions. Among others, the community encompasses Indian nationals studying or working in the United States,

native-born citizens whose parents and grandparents were both born in the United States, and naturalized citizens who found their way to America and decided to make it their long-term home. The community is also growing at a rapid clip: 70 percent of all Indian immigrants residing in the United States arrived in the last quarter-century.

How does this diverse group engage with civic and political institutions in the United States? How do its members maintain connections with their Indian roots while establishing their identities in America? In what ways are they excluded from social life in the United States due to discrimination or rising nationalism? And to what extent do identity markers like religion and caste shape their daily lives and themselves become markers of discrimination and exclusion?

India in BRICS: Power, Pressure & Possibility: Decoding India's Rise, Rivalries, and Role in Shaping a New Global Order

The advent of the 21st century ushered in shifting power dynamics, with emerging nations asserting greater influence in global governance. BRICS stands out as a leading group among new global power structures as it represents over 40% of the global population, 25% of global GDP, and nearly 20% of world trade, giving it significant leverage in shaping global economic and geopolitical trends, BRICS a plurilateral grouping of Brazil.

The BRICS membership presents India with both strategic benefits and geopolitical challenges.

THE BRICS VISION: A PLATFORM FOR MULTIPOLARITY

The BRICS group was formed as an opposing force to challenge IMF and World Bank authority and create a new global leadership structure. Since its establishment, India has maintained its commitment to a world system which provides equal representation to emerging economies. Through its BRICS membership, India works to reform the global financial system and advance fair trade practices and development priorities for Southern nations.

Through BRICS, India aims to reshape global order by promoting multipolarity, reducing Western dominance, and leading Global South driven institutions like the New Development Bank. India uses the platform to build a more democratic global institutional framework which opposes dominant structures that have traditionally excluded Asian, African and Latin American perspectives.

ECONOMIC ASPIRATIONS: TRADE, INVESTMENT AND DEVELOPMENT

BRICS caters to India’s economic needs that include trade prospects, investment promotion and development enhancement.

The main benefit of BRICS membership for India is its access to various financial frameworks.

The Secret History of China’s Most Powerful Company

Robert Wihtol

How did a small Shenzhen-based manufacturer of telephone switches defy tough domestic and international competition to become a world leader in telecoms technology? And how did it manage to start producing its own 5G processors despite international sanctions specifically designed to prevent this from happening?

Telecoms equipment makers are notoriously publicity-shy. They guard their trade secrets jealously and manage their public images carefully. But even by the sector’s exacting standards, Huawei, currently the world’s largest manufacturer of telecommunications equipment, is exceptionally secretive. Its founder, Ren Zhengfei, studiously avoids the limelight, and media visits to the company’s huge campus in Dongguan in southern China are carefully curated and give away little.

In House of Huawei, Eva Dou lifts the veil of secrecy surrounding the tight-lipped company. Dou is a technology reporter for The Washington Post and spent seven years in China and Taiwan covering politics and technology for The Wall Street Journal. Tapping into her wide network of contacts in the sector, she has put together a thoroughly researched, credible and balanced account.

Dou anchors her narrative in China’s recent economic history. Ren established Huawei in 1987 in the Shenzhen special economic zone to manufacture telephone switches for China’s burgeoning economy. Before establishing the company, he worked for the engineering corps of the armed forces. According to Dou, Ren’s military work had little connection with his later work at Huawei but deeply influenced his management style.

Dou highlights two turning points. The shift from analogue to digital technology in the early 1990s allowed Huawei to expand production and begin supplying China’s state-owned enterprises. At that point, Ren made sure that his company was on the radar screen of the country’s top leaders. The second turning point came a decade later, when Huawei went global

The world is dangerously close to a new crisis

Roger Bootle

Last week we saw yet again the power of the financial markets. Pretty much as soon as Rachel Reeves’s tears were seen in the House of Commons, or Reevesgate as I shall call it, both the price of gilts and the pound fell, echoing on a much smaller scale what happened in reaction to the Truss/Kwarteng mini-Budget in 2022.

Behind the human drama and the obsessions of the political class, there lurks a much more important problem. The elephant in the room is the appallingly high level of government debt, which is running at about 100pc of GDP. Last week’s mini-crisis may simply be the harbinger of much worse to come.

According to many on the Left, supported by some economists, nothing like this should happen.

Do you remember the Magic Money Tree (MMT) that briefly flourished when Jeremy Corbyn was leader of the Labour Party? Conveniently, the initials MMT also apply to the economic doctrine known as Modern Monetary Theory, which avers that governments can borrow from the markets willy nilly without consequence.

You don’t hear much about that idea these days. And with good reason. It is perfectly plain that there are limits to the markets’ appetite for government debt. We have reached them.

The UK’s awkward position on public debt is by no means unique in the world. In the US, the so-called “ One Big Beautiful Bill” has just passed Congress.

The consequence is going to be an increase in the US budget deficit. Indeed, it is difficult to see how this is going to come down anytime soon from its current rate of about 6pc of GDP. At present, the US debt ratio is running at about 100pc, but if the deficit continues at current levels, it is reasonable to suppose that the debt ratio will reach 120pc by the mid-2030s.

BRICS At Rio De Janeiro: What Next? – Analysis

Kester Kenn Klomegah

Popularly referred to as BRICS, the informal group of emerging-market economies (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), meeting in Rio de Janeiro, has outlined a new unprecedented multitude of goals to challenge unipolar system. In the context of rising uncertainty, BRICS has further set up new models to change the economic architecture through South-South cooperation.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva hosted early July BRICS summit in Rio de Janeiro, capital city of Brazil. U.S. President Donald Trump’s position on many sensitive issues has offered the association something of a dilemma. In a joint statement decried “the rise of unjustified unilateral protectionist measures” and the “indiscriminate raising” of tariffs. BRICS members all agree that “these tariffs are not productive,” Ambassador Xolisa Mabhongo, South Africa’s lead negotiator, or sherpa, said in an interview. “They are not good for the world economy. They are not good for development.”

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has a raft of controversies with United States over the introduction of single BRICS currency, a suggestion he mooted in 2023. Besides that Brazil is currently facing steep economic challenges in the face of trade frictions with the United States. Majority of his citizens are facing deportation,

it implies significant fallen in remittances and that would worsen social and financial standing of families across Brazil. It has had diverse criticisms, so are other new BRICS members with vastly different political and economic systems, and yet advocating for reshaping the global balance of power. Most of them are negotiating to be at discussion table, to straighten economic ties, with President Donald Trump.

On one hand, BRICS leaders seriously Trump’s “indiscriminate” import tariffs and other trade policies. On the other hand, Trump has also warned that countries which sideline with the policies of the BRICS alliance against United States interests will be hit with an extra 10% tariffs.

Has pacifism doomed Tibet?The Dalai Lama has become a curio

“In war-torn Asia, Tibetans have practiced non-violence for over a thousand years…” So begins Martin Scorsese’s epic 1997 drama Kundun. Denied filming in India, dropped by Universal, disavowed by its eventual distributor Disney as a “stupid mistake” that alienated China, its release was almost miraculous. Yet, for all its merits,

its opening claim, far from being a scrupulous summation of Tibetan history, still stands out as one of the more sensational exhibits of the seraphic spell radiated by Tibet’s most illustrious export: Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama.

Tibet was never a particularly peaceable place. Its empire, at its summit in the 8th century, extended to northern India, western China and central Asia. The Arabs, making inroads into the neighbourhood, were awestruck. And China, in the words of an inscription memorialising Tibet’s conquest of the Tang Chinese capital of Chang’an in 763, “shivered with fear” at their mention. But, peaking early,

Tibet decayed over subsequent centuries into a reclusive hagiarchy. In 1950, when Mao’s Red Army marched in, Tibet possessed neither the vocabulary to parley with the communists, nor the capacity to resist them.

Tenzin Gyatso, identified in 1937 as the reincarnation of the 13th Dalai Lama, was hastily confirmed as Tibet’s supreme ruler at the age of 15. His court, spurned by the outside world, watched helplessly as Mao’s “peaceful liberation” of Tibet unfolded in earnest. Monasteries were razed, monks executed,

thousands of peaceful protesters massacred — with many more detained, starved, tortured, and carted away to communes to toil in conditions so brutal that some resorted to cannibalism. In 1959, the Dalai Lama, facing imminent capture, escaped to India with his entourage.

Ranking the Strongmen

Ramachandra Guha,

Men in power are often animated by the desire to retain and consolidate their power—but not always by that alone. Sometimes, personal aggrandizement goes hand in hand with a sense of personal destiny that embraces a world larger than oneself. Consider in this regard Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan, India’s Narendra Modi, and Russia’s Vladimir Putin.

All three populist strongmen have been ruthless in their exercise of power and in their suppression of any threats to its perpetuation. At the same time,

each is also propelled by the wish to make his country a more powerful and respected voice in global affairs. Whether they have, or can, is another matter. (I myself think not.) But that they have this ambition is indisputable. Erdogan, Modi, and Putin each believe that their once great countries lost their way due to external pressure and internal decay and that history has sent them to redeem their homelands and restore them to their past glories.

At first sight, Donald Trump may seem to fit this bill, in so far as his professed aim is to “make America great again.” Yet, as his actions in his first term as U.S. president and even more so in his second show, unlike Erdogan, Modi, and Putin,

Trump is animated almost exclusively by personal vanity. In this, the current leader of the world’s richest and most powerful nation is strikingly akin to a past leader of a country with which it shares a so-called special relationship. Indeed, perhaps the best way to understand Trump is to view him as Britain’s Boris Johnson on steroids.

What the War Changed Inside Iran

Alex Vatanka,

The 12-day war between Iran, Israel, and the United States has ended, but the dust has not yet settled. Many official voices in Tehran are warning that the war can resume at any moment. Iran now faces deepening economic turmoil,

political uncertainty, and hard choices about its nuclear future. The central question is whether the Islamic Republic will emerge stronger through nationalist mobilization or weaker, exposed by vulnerabilities it long sought to deny. No doubt, Iran’s leaders stand at a true crossroads. Beyond a video message,

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s continued absence from public view raises doubts about his ability to dictate policy, particularly as Israeli threats linger. This possible gap in authority could open space for pragmatic voices within the regime, but such a shift is far from certain.

Analysis and updates

Israeli strikes and subsequent U.S. bombings on June 22 focused overwhelmingly on Iran’s nuclear sites and ballistic missile program. On the 11th day of the war, Israel did hit elements of the regime’s coercive apparatus—the headquarters of the Basij (which includes anti-riot forces), Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps security units,

law enforcement intelligence, and even the notorious Evin prison—but these attacks came late and almost as an afterthought. By prioritizing nuclear and missile targets over the regime’s machinery of domestic control, Israel signaled that toppling the Islamic Republic through popular uprising was not its core objective, nor is there any evidence that Israel has such a policy option given the magnitude of what regime change in Tehran would require. Still, these late strikes served as a stark warning to Iran’s leaders of what could await them if the war continued.

Ukraine’s Drone Revolution

The war between Russia and Ukraine began with an unprovoked combined air and ground assault, then settled into a mid-twentieth-century-style artillery standoff, and has now evolved into the world’s first conflict waged largely by drones.

Last year, Ukraine launched a series of successful long-range drone strikes against ammunition depots hundreds of miles inside Russian territory. Such strikes have been ongoing ever since. Every day, the Ukrainian military deploys thousands of shorter-range drones to defend against Russian ground assaults,

largely replacing the Howitzer shells that were previously the lifeblood of the conflict. Kyiv is locked in a technological and production arms race to ensure that its drones are both sophisticated enough and plentiful enough to overcome Russian jamming and other countermeasures. Ukraine’s innovators are still reaching new heights: in June, Ukrainian drones caused billions of dollars in damage to advanced military aircraft in remote parts of Russia.

The United States has played an important role in this Ukrainian success, seeding the expansion in this key area of the country’s defense industrial base and financing the most promising Ukrainian drone manufacturers, to help Ukraine reach a level of production once unimaginable—millions of autonomous systems per year. Today, the remarkable pace of this innovation, forged by necessity under battlefield conditions found nowhere else on the planet, presents an opportunity for the United States.

To seize it, the Department of Defense and U.S. industry must learn from Ukraine’s drones and other defense technology. The war between Russia and Ukraine is not perfectly analogous to contingencies that the United States may face in the future, and not every lesson in Ukraine is applicable to U.S. military planning, but this war is nonetheless full of instructive technological innovations and breakthroughs.

Next Army: Envisioning the U.S. Army at 250 and Beyond

As the U.S. Army nears its 250th birthday, a new revolution in land power is underway. Next Army—a CSIS Futures Lab and Modern War Institute series—explores how AI, drones, and doctrinal shifts are transforming the battlefield for the age of agentic warfare.

As the U.S. Army approaches its 250th anniversary, a generational transformation is underway. Next Army, a CSIS Futures Lab project, examines how technological disruption, evolving threat environments, and a tradition of institutional innovation are reshaping the character of land power. The Army is on the cusp of its next doctrinal revolution—one that may prove as significant as Emory Upton’s post-Civil War reforms, Donn Starry’s AirLand Battle concept, or Gordon Sullivan’s push into information-age warfare.

The Army of tomorrow will wage agentic warfare, powered by ubiquitous sensor networks, AI, and autonomous systems. Uncrewed aerial systems—ranging from nano-drones to loitering munitions—will saturate the battlespace, turning tactical maneuver into a contest of data and deception.

Swarming drones will reconnoiter, jam, and strike, while AI-enabled edge computing will help small units localize decision-making at machine speed. Instead of sprawling command posts layered in staff officers, expect lean, mobile teams working through cloud-native kill webs and AI agents to deliver precision effects across domains.

At the center of this future is the land domain—not just terrain to be held or crossed, but a critical connective tissue linking cyber, space, and fires into a unified campaign. The Next Army will be smaller, smarter, and more networked, with humans and machines collaborating in complex adaptive systems to out cycle adversaries.

2024 Was Another Great Year for the U.S. in IW

Thomas Searle

TAMPA, FLORIDA - MAY 8: A U.S. Navy Special Warfare Combatant-Craft Crewman (SWCC) wears a U.S. flag patch during a capabilities demonstration at Special Operations Forces (SOF) Week at the Tampa Convention Center on May 8, 2024 in Tampa, Florida. According to the city, the demonstration will feature more than 170 United States Special Operations Command and international service members from 10 nations will take part in mock scenario defending the city of Tampa from ‘hostile invaders.’ (Photo by Luke Sharrett/Getty Images)

A year and a half ago, at the beginning of 2024, a short article appeared under the provocative title “The Future of Irregular Warfare: The United States is Winning, Now What?”. For decades, the prevailing narrative was consistent U.S. failure in irregular warfare (IW) and consistent adversary success. Since both narratives are false, it was long past time for an article like that one to set the record straight. The first months of the second Trump Administration are producing a barrage of dramatic daily news that makes it hard to predict the future of U.S. performance in IW. However, one can still see the past clearly and data is available to assess IW performance in 2024. Did the U.S. continue to outperform its adversaries in IW in 2024?

In ranking the U.S. and its main adversaries, from worst to best, here is how nations performed in IW in 2024.

Iran: The Biggest Loser

In 2024, the IW performance of Iran and its self-proclaimed Axis of Resistance was catastrophic for Iran. One year ago, Iran could claim that it controlled (or at least heavily influenced) four Arab countries: Syria (through the Assad regime), Lebanon (through Hezbollah), Iraq (through the Iraqi militias it sponsors), and Yemen (through the Houthis). Iran could also take pride in the ability of its Palestinian proxies—Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the rest—to shock Israel and the world on October 7, 2023. In 2024, however, Iran lost its two most important assets, Syria and Hezbollah, and Iran now appears to be one of the many victims of the October 7 attack.

Europe does not have to choose between guns and butter. There is another way

European governments are once again haunted by a tough choice between financing the military or spending on social programmes. That, at any rate, is the narrative that has taken hold since Donald Trump’s retreat from the postwar global security order and the urgent pressure to rearm Europe.

But to frame the dilemma facing Europe in this way is a big mistake. History teaches us that the political choice has never been about guns or butter, but rather guns or taxes.

The collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s seemed to close almost a century of global ideological conflict, but it was also supposed to make us all richer. With the end of the cold war, Europeans would no longer need to uphold an expensive military apparatus for territorial defence. Governments ditched conscription and walked back defence outlays. Cashing in on that so-called “peace dividend”, governments could spend on the domestic priorities of their liking, boosting non-military investment.

Last month’s Nato summit in The Hague showed how this tide has been dramatically reversed. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and Trump’s uncertain commitment to Nato means that European governments have no choice but to invest more in their own mutual defence. The peace dividend, as Kristalina Georgieva, the head of the IMF, stated, “is gone”. Europe’s Nato members pledged to increase spending on “hard defence”, such as tanks and military salaries, from 2% to 3.5% of GDP by 2035.

The question now is how to finance it. For some experts, the only way to build a warfare state that can deter Russia is to slash social spending. After all, goes the misleading argument, governments in the 1990s splashed the savings from defence on expensive welfare promises.

A Real New Middle East Is Emerging | Opinion

With the White House leading the charge to bring about a long-term ceasefire in Gaza, the return of the hostages, and following the cessation of open and direct conflict between Israel and Iran,

there is hope for optimism in a region where pessimism is the default setting. Despite the heavy toll of the recent conflicts, a new geopolitical landscape is taking shape in the Middle East—one that holds the promise of lasting transformation. Call it cautious optimism, or even premature—but the signs are difficult to ignore.

In many ways, Israel's confrontation with Iran, along with the war that began on October 7, marks a tectonic shift in Middle Eastern dynamics.

It began with a fateful decision by Yahya Sinwar, Hamas' leader in Gaza—a decision that set off a cascade across the so-called axis of resistance. What seemed like an isolated, if brutal, escalation now looks more like the first domino in the unraveling of an entire regional alignment.

President Donald Trump meets with Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 4, 2025. ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS/AFP via Getty Images

Even if the Islamic Republic of Iran remains intact, the aftermath of these conflicts will likely leave it severely weakened. Iran may emerge stripped of the vast arsenal it has invested in for decades—its nuclear program, its long-range missile capabilities, and its sprawling proxy networks in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, Gaza, and Yemen. Trillions of dollars in regional influence may now be lost.

For Israel, the immediate imperative is to bring the Gaza war to a close and secure the return of the hostages. But even that task is now shaped by a dramatically altered regional risk landscape. The deterrence equation has changed, as has Israel's room for strategic maneuvering.

Trump calls Musk's new political party 'ridiculous'

US President Donald Trump has hit out at former close ally Elon Musk over the multi-billionaire's plan to launch a new political party.

"I think it's ridiculous to start a third party," said Trump, speaking to reporters on Sunday before boarding Air Force One. "It's always been a two-party system and I think starting a third party just adds to the confusion."

After teasing the idea for weeks, Musk posted on X over the weekend that he had set up the America Party to challenge the Republican and Democratic "Uniparty".

Trump and Musk were formerly close allies, with the Tesla boss leading the Department of Government Efficiency (Doge), which is tasked with helping to cut federal spending.

Musk has repeatedly criticised government policies that increase the US national debt.

On Sunday, he said that while the new party may back a presidential candidate at some point "the focus for the next 12 months is on the House and the Senate."

Trump also posted on his Truth Social platform on Sunday: "I am saddened to watch Elon Musk go completely 'off the rails,' essentially becoming a train wreck over the past five weeks."

The post took aim at Musk's push for an "Electric Vehicle (EV) Mandate", saying it would have "forced everyone to buy an electric car in a short period of time."

The president's tax and spending plan, which he signed into law on 4 July, ended tax breaks for electric vehicles.

He added that he had opposed Musk's proposal for an EV mandate from the beginning, explaining the reasons for omitting such vehicles in the legislation.

Trump threatens extra 10% tariff on nations siding with Brics

US President Donald Trump has warned that countries which side with the policies of the Brics alliance that go against US interests will be hit with an extra 10% tariff.

"Any country aligning themselves with the Anti-American policies of BRICS, will be charged an ADDITIONAL 10% tariff. There will be no exceptions to this policy," Trump wrote on social media.

Trump has long criticised Brics, an organisation whose members include China, Russia and India.

The US had set a 9 July deadline for countries to agree a trade deal, but US officials now say tariffs will begin on 1 August. Trump said he would send letters to countries telling them what the tariff rate will be if an agreement is not reached.

On Monday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he expected "a busy couple of days".

"We've had a lot of people change their tune in terms of negotiations. So my mailbox was full last night with a lot of new offers, a lot of new proposals," he told CNBC.

So far, the US has only struck trade agreements with the UK and Vietnam, as well as a partial deal with China.

Although, Britain and America have still not reached a deal over taxes for UK steel imported by the US.

Since taking office this year, Trump has announced a series of import tariffs on goods from other countries, arguing they will boost American manufacturing and protect jobs.

In April, on what he called "Liberation Day", he announced a wave of new taxes on goods from countries around the world - with some as high as 50% - although he quickly suspended his most aggressive plans to allow for three months of talks up until 9 July.

How Trump Can Finish the Job in Iran—and the Middle East

Since taking office, U.S. President Donald Trump has gone for gold in the Middle East. He launched a dramatic military operation against Iran’s nuclear program, building on the broader dismantling of the country’s regional power.

He then brokered a cease-fire between Israel and Iran and indicated a willingness to talk with the Iranian government. These outcomes have provided hope that if the United States can focus on the essential—the continued containment and further weakening of Iran—and avoid overcommitment to myriad other regional policy objectives, the Middle East might finally have the stability and normalcy it

Inside Afghanistan’s deadly arms trade American guns are a jihadi’s best friend

Sher Khan dominates any room he walks into. That’s hardly surprising, and not just because he’s an arms trader. Tall and dark with a thickening beard, he fully deserves his nom de guerre: translated from Pashto,

“Sher Khan” means “The King of Lions”. It’s an image he’s honed for a while, dealing in death for a decade from his base in southern Afghanistan. Speaking to UnHerd using a pseudonym, Khan explains he long sold Russian guns — relics of the long and brutal war against the Soviets.

But if this middle-aged bruiser was happy making money from the basics, hawking Kalashnikovs to twitchy tribal leaders, in 2021 the unthinkable happened. That summer, Nato’s mission in Afghanistan abruptly crumbled, with the Taliban seizing Kabul in a blitzkrieg strike. The result? A mountain of foreign military hardware, from machine guns to drones, all unclaimed and up for the taking.

All this helped men like Sher Khan, flush with weapons and keen to talk shop. Yet if Afghanistan’s arms trade is booming, there are rising signs that the chaos of the American departure could yet bring more death, as high-quality Western weapons are snatched up by extremists and terrorists across the region — with the US itself unable, or unwilling, to stop them.

It’s hard to overstate how much equipment Nato left behind after its botched evacuation of Bagram Airbase. According to one report, published a few months after the Taliban returned to power, Afghanistan’s new rulers had seized over 300,000 small arms, 26,000 heavy weapons, and about 61,000 military vehicles. This claim broadly aligns with an assessment by the US Department of Defense, which found that over $7 billion worth of matériel had essentially been abandoned to the Taliban

How Dare Israel Win a Defensive War!

Seth Mandel

Imagine reading the following headline: “Man shoved onto subway tracks survives, but at what cost?”

This is how the media handles the story every time Israel outwits its enemies and lives to fight another day.

The latest version comes from Michael Shear in the New York Times, though it is entirely representative of the general theme of postwar reporting on Israel, to say nothing of the social-media “influencers” forced to find some way to cope with another successful Israeli defense of its sovereignty.

The Times headline is: “The Cost of Victory: Israel Overpowered Its Foes, but Deepened Its Isolation.”

Translation: The losing side is resentful of the victors.

The headline’s claim doesn’t even hold up. Israel had the use of Syrian airspace for its attacks on Iran, and Jerusalem and Damascus are in negotiations over burying the hatchet completely. Flying over the Arab world to take out Iran’s air defenses is a sign not of isolation but of integration.

That quibble aside, there is a larger problem with this conceit. Take this paragraph from Shear’s piece:

“Mr. Netanyahu’s relentless and unapologetic military response to the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack that killed 1,200 people and took 250 people hostage has cemented the view of Israel as a pariah, its leadership accused of genocide and war crimes, and disdained by some world leaders. In opinion polls globally, most people have a negative view of Israel.”

Unipolarity and Middle East Peace

Shai Feldman

The 22 months that began with Hamas’ horrific attack against Israel’s southern communities on October 7, 2023 and that have led to the 12-day Israel-Iran war in June 2025 have changed the strategic map of the Middle East. Most dramatically, the United States has emerged as by far the most important external player in the region,

resulting in a new unipolar moment in Middle East history. In this new regional configuration, America has no significant external competitors. Russia could not even prevent the downfall of Bashar Assad’s regime, despite its huge previous investments in that regime’s defense.

Hence the striking resemblance between this new environment and the Middle East that emerged following the collapse of the Soviet Union in the late 1980s and the victory of the US-led coalition in the January 1991 First Gulf War. That first unipolar moment allowed President George HW Bush and Secretary of State James Baker to convene the Madrid Peace conference, to open the successful Israel-Jordan peace negotiations and the less successful Israeli-Syrian negotiations,

to create the conditions that allowed the pathbreaking Israeli-PLO Oslo Accords, and to launch the now-forgotten multilateral talks encompassing Israel, the PLO, and 13 Arab governments to address the region’s most pressing issues.

Similarly, the new unipolar moment now allowed US President Donald Trump to dictate a deadline—within 60 days, or else—for Iran to accept his demand that it would abandon its uranium enrichment activities. When Iran failed to commit itself to doing so, Trump gave Israel a green light to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities. Some 10 days later, Trump joined the fight directly by sending America’s own B-2 bombers to bomb Fordow and other Iranian nuclear facilities.

Russia Has Only One Goal: Destroy Ukraine

Alexander Motyl

Key Points and Summary – The Trump administration’s approach to Russia is dangerously naive, as President Trump continues to believe he can negotiate an end to the Ukraine war with a bad-faith actor like Vladimir Putin.

-Despite Putin’s maximalist demands and escalating attacks on Ukrainian civilians, the White House continues to engage in phone calls that yield no progress.

America Is Making a Giant Mistake on Russia

July 4th is a good day to ask whether the Trump administration will ever declare independence of its illusions about Russia and its illegitimate president.

Like King George, Vladimir Putin is overbearing and arrogant toward the Americans, but unlike the British monarch, Russia is playing the American president for a fool.

And he’s doing so openly and directly.

Putin Wants to Destroy Ukraine

Putin and his minions have repeatedly stated that Russia will not agree to a ceasefire or peace in its genocidal war against Ukraine until Kyiv agrees to a permanent loss of Russian-occupied territory, abandons its hopes of joining the West, and transforms itself into an authoritarian vassal of Russia. And since Ukrainians cannot agree to such demands, Putin’s conditions for peace amount to his unwavering determination to continue with the war and genocide.

Putin has also put his money where his mouth is, vastly increasing the number of attacks on Ukrainian cities and civilians since Trump’s inauguration and his administration’s all-carrots-and-no-sticks approach to dealing with the Kremlin.

And yet, despite Russia’s continued commitment to annihilate Ukraine, the Trump administration continues to believe that Putin wants peace and is willing to negotiate in good faith and that phone calls will convince Russia’s bloodthirsty tyrant to end the war.

More Talk?

How Trump Will Be Remembered

Stephen M. Walt,

U.S. presidents have big egos—if they didn’t, their chances of reaching the Oval Office would be slim—and they want to be remembered favorably after they are gone. A few presidents, such as George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D. Roosevelt, enjoy an exalted status in part for their exceptional qualities but also because they overcame challenging circumstances that required extraordinary leadership.

Presidents who govern in more normal times, or whose actions in office are tainted by obvious failures, can only hope they don’t end up near the bottom of one of those lists ranking presidents from best to worst.

As in so many other things, Donald Trump’s obsession with his own place in history is in a class by itself. No other president has made his time in office so nakedly about himself or been as transparent in his desire to be remembered as one of the greatest U.S. presidents. Indeed, he seems to believe that he has already earned this accolade.

Is This an American Cultural Revolution?

Julia Lovell,

As liberal critics of the Trump presidency have scrambled for traction since January, one historical analogy seems ubiquitous: “If you want a model for what’s happening to America,” economist Paul Krugman wrote in April, “think of Mao’s Cultural Revolution.” From the New York Times to the Guardian to a slew of Substacks, commentators have presented Donald Trump as the U.S. incarnation of the Great Helmsman.

Like Mao Zedong, these pundits say, Trump is mobilizing an insurrectionary base to destroy bureaucratic and cultural elites, has created a cult of personality in which the leader’s will overrides all else, and is brutally intolerant of his ideological enemies.

Julia Lovell is a professor of modern Chinese history at Birkbeck, University of London and the author of books including Maoism: A Global History.

Nicholas Guyatt is a professor of North American history at the University of Cambridge.

Read More On China | Culture | Donald Trump | History | Politics | United States

U.S. President Donald Trump looks down and adjusts his suit lapels as he poses alongside other leaders standing in rows for a family photo. The leaders around him face the camera and smile.

Iranian protocol soldiers stand guard during a ceremony to mark the 27th anniversary of the Islamic revolution at the mausoleum of Iran's late founder of Islamic Republic, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in Tehran on Feb. 1, 2006.

AI and the Trust Revolution

When experts worry about young people’s relationship with information online, they typically assume that young people are not as media literate as their elders. But ethnographic research conducted by Jigsaw—Google’s technology incubator—reveals a more complex and subtle reality:

members of Gen Z, typically understood to be people born after 1997 and before 2012, have developed distinctly different strategies for evaluating information online,

ones that would bewilder anyone over 30. They do not consume news as their elders would—namely, by first reading a headline and then the story. They do typically read the headlines first, but then they jump

Millions of websites to get 'game-changing' AI bot blocker

Millions of websites - including Sky News, The Associated Press and Buzzfeed - will now be able to block artificial intelligence (AI) bots from accessing their content without permission.

The new system is being rolled out by internet infrastructure firm, Cloudflare, which provides services to around a fifth of live websites.

Eventually, sites will be able to ask for payment from AI firms in return for having their content scraped.

Many prominent writers, artists, musicians and actors have accused AI firms of training systems on their work without permission or payment.

In the UK, it led to a furious row between the government and artists including Sir Elton John over how to protect copyright.

Cloudflare's tech targets AI firm bots - also known as crawlers - which are programs that explore the web, indexing and collecting data as they go. They are important to the way AI firms build, train and operate their systems.

So far, Cloudflare says its tech is active on a million websites.

Roger Lynch, chief executive of Condé Nast, whose print titles include GQ, Vogue, and The New Yorker, said the move was "a game-changer" for publishers.

"This is a critical step toward creating a fair value exchange on the Internet that protects creators, supports quality journalism and holds AI companies accountable", he wrote in a statement.

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