State of India’s Geospatial Portals

Swathi Kalyani

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Executive Summary

The document looks into the contemporary Indian geospatial portal ecosystem. It offers an overview of the major platforms making geospatial information accessible. It analyses several major hurdles that make the portals less functional – ranging from issues in technical infrastructure, low levels of inter-agency coordination, and regulatory constraints.It draws comparisons with global counterparts, highlighting some best practices to consider for data integration and better user experience.

Swathi Kalyani is a Research Analyst with the Geospatial Research Programme. She can be reached at swathi@takshashila.org.in.

It suggests that for these platforms to fully capitalise on their potential, the user interface needs to be enhanced, clear legal frameworks put in place, and practicality given priority over technical complexity.The author would like to express their sincere gratitude to Dr Y Nithiyanandam for his valuable feedback.t concludes with the idea that although India is technically strong, with a good policy environment—in view of the National Geospatial Policy 2022—real achievement can be attained only when the gap between technical capabilities and user needs is bridged.

AI tools have been used for literature search and content refinement.

1. Introduction

Geospatial portals are digital platforms that provide access to location-based datasets and spatial information. They enable users to visualise, analyse, and download geographic data – ranging from satellite imagery to administrative boundaries and environmental monitoring datasets. These portals serve diverse purposes: some are primarily designed for visualisation and navigation, such as Google Maps, which displays interactive street maps and satellite imagery for everyday movements, while others function as comprehensive data repositories, like ISRO’s Bhoonidhi. Bhoonidhi allows users to download raw, remotely sensed datasets, including for scientific studies and geospatial applications.

Geospatial portals serve as common digital doorways for sharing spatial data that supports decision-making across various sectors. They also simplify complex satellite imagery and geographic information into a user-friendly interface, so that all relevant stakeholders can access location intelligence. The platforms consolidate overwhelming amounts of spatial data, thus aiding scaled evidence-based planning and policy-making. Increasing visibility into the value of geospatial intelligence has made it ubiquitous across applications such as traffic monitoring, urban planning, agriculture, and disaster management.

India Ramps Up AI Use for Military

Amir Daftari

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India is fast emerging as an AI‑enabled military power, investing heavily in artificial intelligence as it joins the global race to modernize defense, according to a new Cybernews report.

“AI will enhance battlefield awareness and decision‑making at the tactical level in a complex battlefield environment,” Lieutenant Colonel Abhaya Mahajan told the outlet.

From autonomous drones to predictive maintenance, India is embedding AI at the heart of its armed forces, signaling a major shift in how militaries worldwide are preparing for next‑generation warfare.

Newsweek has reached out to India's Foreign Ministry for comment.

Why It Matters

AI is becoming central to modern military strategy, where success increasingly depends on speed, data integration, and autonomous systems rather than manpower alone. India’s Operation Sindoor, a cross-border mission against terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan in May, tested AI in real time, using precision strikes and intelligence-driven maneuvers.

Militaries from the United States to China and Israel are embedding AI across operations, signaling that technological superiority will define next-generation warfare.

Paper Promises: The Limits of Pakistan's Defence Guarantee to Saudi Arabia

Haleema Saadia

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The September 2025 announcement of a “Strategic Mutual Defense Agreement” (SMDA) between Pakistan and Saudi Arabia revived old anxieties about an Islamic bomb being placed at Riyadh’s disposal. These fears are not new. Since the late 1970s, speculation about Pakistan providing Saudi Arabia with nuclear capabilities has recurred with every uptick in bilateral defense cooperation.

Yet, alarmism risks missing the central point: this agreement is far more a political signal than an operational transformation. It offers both governments symbolic reassurance in a volatile moment but falls far short of constituting a credible nuclear umbrella. Understanding why requires two lenses often missing in policy commentary: the theory of extended deterrence and the legal architecture of nuclear governance. Both lenses highlight why Pakistan cannot, and is unlikely to, extend nuclear deterrence to Saudi Arabia in any meaningful sense.

This commentary unpacks the defence pact along three lines. First, it draws on deterrence theory to explain what is required for states to credibly extend deterrence and why Pakistan does not meet these requirements. Second, it examines the international legal and nonproliferation constraints that would make any Pakistani nuclear guarantee controversial and potentially illegal. Third, it situates the pact in the broader politics of US-Saudi relations, Gulf insecurity, Pakistan’s domestic imperatives, and nuclear governance, and explains why this pact is more symbolic than anything else.

Extended Deterrence and Its Requirements

Extended deterrence refers to a state’s ability and willingness to use its capabilities, often nuclear weapons, to defend an ally against attack. The Cold War produced rich literature on what makes such deterrence credible, which translates to: the capability to project power on behalf of an ally, the interests at stake that make defending the ally plausible, and the credibility of commitments through signaling and alliance structures.

China's new gateway into South America: the Port of Chancay - Asia Times

The port will translate into greater Chinese leverage over trade and infrastructure – further sidelining the US

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This article was originally published by Pacific Forum. It is republished with permission.

China has emerged as an economic and strategic competitor of the United States in South America.

As part of the Belt and Road Initiative, China has funneled $1.3 billion into the new Peruvian Port of Chancay, a deepwater facility that became fully operational in November 2024. The port will deepen the trade relationship between South America and China, the region’s largest trade partner, and will reorient Pacific shipping networks away from US port infrastructure.

It will further elevate China as not only the region’s largest trading partner, but as a powerful actor with leverage over local infrastructure and trade at a time when the US has stepped back from free trade institutions and has increasingly isolated itself from the region.

North of Lima, the Port of Chancay is the first South American port on the continent’s West Coast with the capability to receive ultra large container vessels (UCLVs). With majority ownership (60%) held by the Chinese state-owned conglomerate COSCO shipping, the port has unlocked a new major transpacific shipping channel between China and South America that bypasses the traditional deepwater ports in the US and Mexico.

Before the construction of the Port of Chancay, no deepwater port along South America’s West Coast could handle UCLVs, which carry 18,000 to 24,000 shipping containers and require a port of at least 16-17 meters of depth.

Previously, these massive cargo ships had to travel north to Mexico’s Port of Lázaro Cárdenas or US ports of Los Angeles, Long Beach, and Oakland. This created a logistical dependency on these ports, as they served as a critical transshipment connection for UCLV cargo processing for South American trade. From there, goods would be reloaded onto smaller ships that would travel to smaller South American ports.

Chancay effectively eliminates this costly and inefficient detour. When Chinese goods pass through US transshipment ports, the US retains a degree of logistical control and visibility over the flow of goods. Chancay bypasses that system entirely, reducing US insight over Chinese trade into South America. The transition has already begun. In April, China announced its first major shipping lane from its southern port of Guangzhou directly to Chancay, which will now circumvent North American ports.

Chancay was expected to process 1-1.5 million shipping containers in its first year alone, with full capacity in the next several years estimated to reach 3.5 million.

Why Are China’s Generals So Quiet as Xi Purges Them?

The PLA is a politically neutered army.

Deng Yuwen,

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A Chinese writer and scholar.Two Chinese generals in formal uniforms decorated with awards and honors sit behind a large wooden desk during a meeting. Both men wear serious expressions; the one on the left has his hand lifted to his face.He Weidong (right), the second-ranked vice chairman of China’s Central Military Commission, attends the closing session of the National People’s Congress at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on March 11. Pedro Pardo/AFP via Getty Images

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October 30, 2025, 2:04 PM

China’s military recently expelled nine top leaders from both the Communist Party and the armed forces, including Central Military Commission Vice Chairman He Weidong and chief political commissar Miao Hua.

In the past few years, successive defense ministers, Li Shangfu and Wei Fenghe, were purged; before them, former Central Military Commission (CMC) Vice Chairmen Xu Caihou and Guo Boxiong fell. Counting the many other officers expelled since President Xi Jinping came to power more than a decade ago, one could almost line up a platoon of purged generals.

China’s Coming Small Wars

Michael Hanson

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The world took note of the meteoric growth of China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA), both in size and capability. Specifically, the PLA and PLAN’s amphibious capabilities development is impressive and alarming. According to many experts, the reason for this rapid development is the forceful reintegration of the island of Taiwan into the People’s Republic of China (PRC).1 Analysts argue that a PLA cross-strait amphibious invasion of Taiwan would be the largest amphibious assault in history, greater in scale and complexity than invasions of Normandy and Okinawa, the largest amphibious operations in each theater during World War II.2

A cross-strait operation would be a serious challenge for a world-class military. Though the Chinese military is quickly reaching peer status with the United States military in many areas, the PLA is not currently ready for a daunting amphibious invasion of Taiwan. The PLA remains untested. Chinese leaders will likely subject their prototype to a series of test runs before committing to such a fateful mission. History and current events show small wars and limited interventions serve as useful training grounds to develop the leadership, processes, and capabilities of military forces for larger designs. At present, North Korean troops are active participants in the war in Ukraine to presumably gain combat experience of their own.3 Likewise, before China embarks on a major war, it will likely hone its edge in small ones.

According to the renowned military historian Basil H. Liddell Hart, “A landing on a foreign coast in the face of hostile troops has always been one of the most difficult operations of war.”4 To establish a lodgment, not only does the offensive force have to overcome a defending force, but significant geographic and climatic factors. Once successfully seizing a beachhead, the attacker must break out from it and begin a land campaign in which it can still meet defeat if it does not have adequate logistics to sustain its campaign. Even once ashore, the challenges of sustaining a campaign overseas are significantly greater than doing so overland. It is for these reasons that successful amphibious campaigns have been the domain of a relatively few militaries in modern history.

How China really spies on the UK

Gordon Corera

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It is a question that successive governments have struggled with: what kind of threat does China really pose to the UK?

Trying to answer it may have contributed to the high-profile collapse of the case in which two British men, Christopher Cash and Christopher Berry, were accused of spying for China and charged under the Official Secrets Act.

Both deny wrongdoing - but when charges were dropped last month, it sparked political outcry.

Prosecutors and officials have since offered conflicting accounts about whether a failure or unwillingness to label China as an active threat to national security led to the withdrawal of the charges. And yesterday Lord Hermer, the attorney general, blamed "out of date" legislation for the case's collapse.

But this all raises the question of what exactly Chinese espionage looks like in the modern world.

AFP via Getty Images

What lies at the heart of the problem is that the national security threats China poses today go beyond traditional notions of espionage

On one level, China spies within the traditional framework of the old ways of human espionage associated with the Cold War, with spies working under the cover of being diplomats, and recruiting people to pass secrets.

The witness statement by a deputy national security adviser for prosecutors investigating the now-collapsed case of Cash and Berry outlines this kind of work.

"The Chinese Intelligence Services are interested in acquiring information from a number of sources, including policymakers, government staff and democratic institutions and are able to act opportunistically to gather all information they can."

Here is the thing though. Pretty much every country does this kind of spying - wanting insight into what other countries are up to is as old as the hills. The UK conducts this kind of espionage against China (as China itself has publicly complained about). When countries get caught there is normally a public row but each side knows it is normal business.

But this barely covers the breadth of the Chinese behaviour that worries security officials.

"Try not to think too much just in terms of classic card-carrying spies based out of the embassy in the John le Carre mould," the head of MI5 Sir Ken McCallum said during a briefing on national security threats earlier this month.

For what truly sets China apart - and what lies at the heart of the problem - is that the national security threats China poses go beyond traditional notions of espionage.

To complicate matters further, some of the threats are also closely tied up with the reasons many believe we need to enga

1st “Commercial Space” War Ignites! India, China, Russia Join U.S. To Weaponize Orbit With Private Mega Constellations

Prakash Nanda

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If anything, satellite imaging company Vantor’s signing of a contract last week with the U.S. Space Force to help run a “neighborhood watch” in space to monitor space-based threats like rogue satellites or debris that ground sensors may miss has reconfirmed a growing trend.

And that is the significant role the private sector now plays in developing and operating spy satellites of the world’s major military powers.

This marks a major shift from the traditional model, where only government space agencies and large defense contractors handled such programs. But now, the commercial sector is often developing technology faster and more cheaply. Defense agencies are leveraging that.

Contractually, Vantor, using its own satellites already in orbit, will monitor space and protect U.S. satellites in the increasingly crowded area between 99 and 1,200 miles above the surface.

It may be noted that there is now an intense new space race, with countries such as the United States, China, Russia, India, and Israel launching more and more satellites into orbit, both civilian and military.

Military satellites have emerged as indispensable in modern warfare. Since the earliest reconnaissance satellites of the Cold War era, space-based assets have evolved into “silent sentinels” that offer unrivaled advantages in “Intelligence, Surveillance & Reconnaissance (ISR); secure communications; navigation and precision strike; missile defense early warning; electronic warfare support; and space situational awareness”.

The former U.S. and Soviet air base has been a central location for empires for thousands of years. Does Trump truly understand its significance?

Freshta Jalalzai

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In this Apr. 25, 2007 file photo, aircraft line the taxiway at Bagram Air Base, Afghanistan.

Credit: U.S. Department of Defense photo by Jim Garamone

I grew up not far from Bagram Airfield, which is located about 60 kilometers north of my childhood home in Kabul. Yet despite that, and the years I spent reporting on the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan, I only fully appreciated Bagram’s historical importance, and the extent to which it had been overlooked in policy and strategy, during a recent visit to Germany.

A statue of Buddha sits behind glass in the Ethnological Museum in Berlin, a priceless gift from the people of Afghanistan to Germany intended to lift the spirits of a war-torn nation after World War I. The relic represents a journey spanning thousands of years.

The statue came from Bagram.

Its hand gestures and symbolic motifs embody Buddhist iconography, while its Hellenistic drapery and naturalistic folds are reminiscent of Greek sculpture. This one artifact embodies the layered history of Afghanistan, and the ebb and flow of power surrounding this fabled citadel on the slopes of the Hindu Kush mountain-range.

Archaeological studies suggest that Bagram began its life as “Alexandria in the Caucasus,” founded by Alexander the Great to command the mountain passes and trade routes of Central Asia all the way to the Far East.

This legacy resurfaced during the Cold War, when Bagram became a central arena of superpower rivalry. While the Soviets set their sights on this historic stronghold in the early 1950s, U.S. engagement remained cautious and limited in scope. Vice President Richard Nixon’s visit in 1953 signaled initial U.S. interest, but policy lacked strategic depth, allowing Soviet influence to intensify. President Dwight Eisenhower’s 1959 visit added symbolic weight, yet Washington’s involvement still fell short of sustaining a strategic foothold.

In the 1960s, the Soviets transformed Bagram into a sprawling hub for projecting influence across northern Afghanistan. They extended the runway and constructed barracks, roads, and a major military plane maintenance facility. As part of its campaign, Soviet Russia also trained thousands of Afghan military pilots, technicians, and engineers who worked at the factory and maintained the aircraft.

Bagram became the largest and most fortified military installation in Afghanistan. Yet it also served as a center for cultural exchange, featuring a school that taught Russian, a theater where Soviet and Afghan artists performed, and other amenities. This setup was part of a Soviet campaign to win the hearts and minds of the Afghan people, which later became the nerve center of Moscow’s 1979 invasion.

During the invasion, most Soviet bomber jets and cargo carriers operated from Bagram due to its central location. Tactical aircraft like the Su-17 and MiG-27 carried out close air support, and transports like the Ilyushin Il-76 and Antonov moved equipment and personnel across the region. A flight from Bagram to Astrakhan, one of the closest Russian settlements west of the Caspian, took roughly three hours, about the same time it takes to fly from Washington, D.C., to Miami. Depending on the aircraft, it took about the same amount of time to fly from Bagram to Makhachkala on the Caspian coast of southern Russia.

After the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan and the collapse of the Soviet-backed government in 1992, Bagram fell into disrepair as Mujahedeen fighters, local thieves, and militias looted the base. Yet it rose from the ashes to once again become a hub during the U.S. and NATO-led invasion of Afghanistan.

Between 2001 and 2021, the United States reportedly invested millions in its expansion, transforming the old Soviet-built compound into a massive, city-sized complex that featured multiple runways, over 120 acres of aircraft parking, hangars, housing, a hospital, and even fast-food outlets for thousands of personnel.

At its peak, the base hosted, at one time, more than 40,000 troops and contractors, serving as the central logistics hub for U.S. and allied operations across Afghanistan and providing a commanding position for air support and surveillance.

Through the years, local residents knew Bagram for its prison holding senior Taliban and al-Qaida figures, often called “Obama’s Gitmo.” During the Taliban’s two-decade fight against the U.S. and NATO, the release of thousands of prisoners was a central demand, culminating in the Doha Agreement and the eventual U.S. withdrawal in 2021.

Hegseth: Nuclear tests bolster credible strategic deterrence, lower risk of nuclear conflict

U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth leaves after a bilateral meeting with Malaysia’s Defense Minister Mohamed Khaled Nordin ahead of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Defense Ministers’ Meeting in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia,

Bill Gertz

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KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia — President Trump’s decision to resume nuclear tests was needed to strengthen the credibility of the U.S. nuclear arsenal and will help prevent nuclear war, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Friday.

Mr. Hegseth told reporters the Pentagon will partner with the Energy Department, which is in charge of maintaining nuclear warheads, on resuming underground tests after Mr. Trump announced this week that the testing will resume.

“The president was clear: We need to have a credible nuclear deterrent. That is the baseline of our deterrence,” Mr. Hegseth said during a meeting with Kao Kim Hourn, secretary general of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, host of an international defense leaders’ conference.

Understanding nuclear warhead capabilities and resuming testing is “a very responsible way to do that,” he said.

“I think it makes nuclear conflict less likely if you know what you have and make sure it operates properly,” he said of underground testing that was halted in 1992.

The Pentagon is moving quickly to implement the president’s directive to resume testing, Mr. Hegseth said.

“We don’t seek conflict with China or any other nation, but the stronger we are, the stronger our alliances are, the more we work with allies in this region and around the

world, I think the less likely conflict becomes,” he said.

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Mr. Trump said the decision to begin testing again after a 33-year hiatus under a self-imposed testing moratorium was based on adversaries resuming nuclear tests. He provided no details on those tests.

However, Russian President Vladimir Putin said recently that if the United States begins nuclear testing again, Russia will also conduct nuclear tests.

“America will ensure that we have the strongest, most capable nuclear arsenal, so that we maintain peace through strength,” Mr. Hegseth said.

The defense chief said that, during multiple bilateral meetings with defense leaders from Southeast Asia states, he stressed the Trump administration’s approach to security is “peace through strength” and the nuclear arsenal is part of it.

War Powers Law Does Not Apply to Trump’s Boat Strikes, Administration Says

The move deepened the idea that a Vietnam-era law, which says congressionally unauthorized deployments into “hostilities” must end after 60 days, does not apply to airstrike campaigns.

Charlie Savage and Julian E. Barnes

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Air Force personnel prepared an MQ-9 Reaper drone in Puerto Rico last month.Credit...Ricardo Arduengo/Reuters

The Justice Department told Congress this week that President Trump could lawfully continue his lethal military strikes on people suspected of smuggling drugs at sea, notwithstanding a time limit for congressionally unauthorized deployments of armed forces into “hostilities.”

In a briefing, the official who leads the department’s Office of Legal Counsel, T. Elliot Gaiser, said the administration did not think the operation rose to the kind of “hostilities” covered by the 60-day limit, a key part of a 1973 law called the War Powers Resolution, according to several people familiar with the matter.

In a statement provided by the White House, an unnamed senior administration official said that American service members were not in danger because the boats suspected of smuggling drugs were mostly being struck by drones far from naval ships carrying U.S. forces.

“The operation comprises precise strikes conducted largely by unmanned aerial vehicles launched from naval vessels in international waters at distances too far away for the crews of the targeted vessels to endanger American personnel,” the official said.

The U.S. military has killed about 62 people across 14 airstrikes on boats in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific so far, and the administration has told Congress that Mr. Trump “determined” that the operation counts as a formal armed conflict.

But the stance that the operation does not count as “hostilities” because the people on the boats could not shoot back builds on a precedent established by President Barack Obama during the 2011 NATO air war over Libya, to significant disagreement at the time in Congress and within Mr. Obama’s own legal team.

The War Powers Resolution says that a president who unilaterally deploys U.S. forces into hostilities “shall terminate” the operation after 60 days if Congress has not authorized it by then. But the legislation left the term “hostilities” vague.

Under that law, the clock starts no later than when a president submits a required 48-hour notice to Congress. President Trump notified Congress about the first strike in his operation on Sept. 4, meaning the 60th day will arrive on Monday. That timing had raised the question of whether he would stop or, if not, how he would justify continuing the operation.

When the White House, Pentagon and Justice Department were asked that question by The New York Times last Wednesday, the administration provided a general statement that did not clarify. But Mr. Gaiser laid out the administration’s position in briefings to lawmakers and some staffers last week. His comments were earlier reported by The Washington Post.

Ukraine isn’t just hurling attack drones; they’re waging real robot warfare

A new RUSI report describes the broad use of air and ground robotic systems—and what they mean for NATO.

PATRICK TUCKER

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Video from the Ukrainian military's first-person drones has captivated millions, but the footage offers only a narrow view of a robotics revolution that is reshaping combined-arms warfare.

Air and ground robotic systems in a wide variety of mutually supporting roles are bringing about a true robot military, writes Jack Watling, a senior research fellow for land warfare at the Royal United Services Institute, or RUSI. His new paper traces the evolution of Ukrainian robot doctrine from simple target spotting to coordinated movements by flying and crawling robots that navigate the battlefield and fight alongside humans.

The shift was born of necessity, Watling writes.

“Political developments in Washington interrupted the provision of military–technical assistance, disrupting Ukraine’s ability to coherently plan the equipping of its forces with its international partners. As a result, Ukraine doubled down on a method which delivered results and was under its control: drones,” he writes. “Two dedicated UAV regiments, and two non-standard brigades of the Armed Forces of Ukraine…are pioneering the use of novel equipment,” as in air and ground drones.

Watling also notes that the heavy use of drones by both sides has led to a new way to conceptualize the battlefield. The frontline forces of Ukraine and Russia are generally separated by about 15 kilometers of ground rendered all but impassable by legions of armed UAVs. Ukrainian war planners call this territory the “grey zone” or the “contested zone.” (U.S. Marines call it “close.”) Beyond it lies the “middle zone,” another roughly 15 km where troops muster weapons, sensors, and jammers. And behind that is the “deep zone” where you find drone factories, logistics centers, and “systems that cannot affect the contested zone but may do so in the future,” he writes.

The key to taking grey-zone territory is isolating elements of the enemy’s forces in the middle zone. So Ukrainian forces have learned to use drones to lay mines and traps to slow reinforcement and resupply efforts.

Three Questions We Should Ask About an Independent US Cyber Force Exploring the proposal for a U.S. Cyber Force

Allison Pytlak • Dan Grazier

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Recent efforts to progress thinking about how to operationalize a proposal to create an independent cyber force within the United States military are sparking a range of questions. These include questions about the necessity of such a force, what it would do, resourcing, and how it would interact with the cyber capabilities of other parts of the military. Proponents argue that amid a landscape of ever-increasing cyber threats from known U.S. adversaries, a focused force is necessary for the United States to keep up while others point to existing capabilities and structures as sufficient. Why now, and how, are among the questions examined in this commentary.

More than 72 years passed between the creation of the U.S. Air Force and the creation of the U.S. Space Force. Now less than a decade after the creation of the latter, Washington is abuzz with serious discussions about spinning off yet another military branch — this time a U.S. Cyber Force. The debates about an independent air force went on for more than two decades, and people talked about the merits of a separate space force for nearly as long. Calls for a cyber force may not have gone on for quite so long, but neither are they entirely new, having mirrored somewhat the establishment and evolution of the U.S. Cyber Command in 2010, aspects of the 2020 Cyberspace Solarium Commission, and ongoing parallel debate over a space force. In 2025, however, the topic is back in a big way with the publication of a new report presenting a blueprint for how to implement a cyber force, and the establishment of a new Commission on Cyber Force Generation.

An expert’s point of view on a current event.

To Deter Russia, Europe Needs Ukraine

A Ukraine-Baltics defense pact would bring Kyiv into Europe’s security architecture.

Fredrik Wesslau, 

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A distinguished policy fellow at the Stockholm Centre for Eastern European Studies.Ukrainian soldiers hold the Ukrainian and Lithuanian flags over the coffin of Tomas Valentelis, a Lithuanian volunteer in the Ukrainian army who was killed in battle in Ukraine, at a funeral ceremony in Kyiv on April 16.Ukrainian soldiers hold the Ukrainian and Lithuanian flags over the coffin of Tomas Valentelis, a Lithuanian volunteer in the Ukrainian army who was killed in battle in Ukraine, at a funeral ceremony in Kyiv on April 16. TETIANA DZHAFAROVA/AFP via Getty Images

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October 30, 2025, 1:51 PM

Europe’s security architecture is being remade in real time. Russia’s war against Ukraine and U.S. President Donald Trump’s return to office has challenged the basic premises on which European security rests. Europe is under threat from Russia and has lost the United States as its ultimate security guarantor.

Russia’s War in Ukraine

Understanding the conflict three years on.

More on this topic

Trump’s hostility toward NATO and ambiguity in relation to Article 5 means that Europe can no longer rely on the United States to come to its defense if Russia attacks. Despite Trump’s occasional feel-good rhetoric about NATO, his unpredictability and unreliability fundamentally undermine the credibility of U.S. commitments to Europe, which are central to NATO’s deterrence.

a’s Tech Obsession Is Weighing Down Its EconomyBy Sc

Russia’s military presence in post-Assad Syria: A growing security liability undermining stability

Samer al-Ahmed

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Syria witnessed a radical and wide-ranging transformation after the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime on Dec. 8, 2024. Almost immediately, questions arose as to whether Russia would be able to maintain its military bases and political influence in a post-Assad Syria; and early reports of troop evacuations and equipment withdrawals seemed to point toward a possible, if not necessarily inevitable, exit. However, six months later, the Russian military presence has remained entrenched in strategic locations such as the Hmeimim airbase and Tartous port on the coast, as well as at Qamishli airport in the northeast. This persistence has reignited an increasingly pressing debate about Moscow’s role in the new Syria: is Russia acting in good faith as a stabilizing actor, or has its presence become an instrument of pressure hobbling the political and security transition?

History and international relations theory tells us that when the governing authority of a geopolitically significant state suddenly collapses, the consequences are rarely confined to its national borders. This is precisely why Kenneth Waltz insisted, “As nature abhors a vacuum, so international politics abhors unbalanced power. Instead, this creates power vacuums and reshapes alliances, which creates a pretext for outside powers to seek to preserve or expand their influence amidst the newly emergent balance of power in the region.” And as the late Henry Kissinger argued in his writings and in interviews, when a regional order collapses, the resulting vacuum invites the intervention of external powers seeking to shape the new balance according to their interests. This theory clearly applies to the current Syrian situation, where Russia is attempting to adapt to the changes brought about by the major regime transformation and assert its position, amidst competition, to redefine the contours of power and influence in the country.

The following article discusses the dimensions of the Russian presence, particularly in Hmeimim and Qamishli, since the overthrow of the Assad regime. Moreover, the piece analyzes the repercussions of that continued Russian presence on the fragmentation of Syria’s security landscape, its implications for Western engagement with Damascus, and the positions of several major external players regarding the future of these military bases. It culminates in a strategic assessment of the role of Russia’s bases and broader influence in Syria: does the nature of the Russian presence represent an obstacle to stability or an opportunity to renegotiate regional power dynamics?

An expert’s point of view on a current event.

We’ve Forgotten What ‘Soft Power’ Is

Internationalists are mourning the loss of soft power. Do they even know what that means anymore?

Suzanne Nossel,

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The Lester Crown senior fellow for U.S. foreign policy and international order at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.Dewy sits at a desk, before a sign that reads: "CRUSADE FOR FREEDOM: SEND A MESSAGE BEHIND THE IRON CURTAIN." Behind him is also a map of the Eastern Bloc with an image of the Statue of Liberty.Thomas Dewey, the governor of New York from 1943 to 1954, broadcasts over the “Crusade for Freedom” radio in this undated photo. Keystone/Getty Images

Since U.S. President Donald Trump returned to office in January, there has been no shortage of liberal internationalists mourning the downfall of U.S. soft power. Trump’s moves to pull back from the United Nations, ravage foreign aid, and mute the Voice of America have dismantled the government’s soft power tool set, while his often derisive and self-interested approach to global engagement—coupled with rapid democratic decay at home—have dimmed the United States’ glow in the eyes of the world.

Trump’s Second Term

Ongoing reports and analysis

But as Americans eulogize soft power, they should push past nostalgia to consider what precisely has been lost. Although opinion surveys show that Washington’s global reputation has indeed suffered since Trump’s second term began, the connecti

Trump and the Test Ban

Lawrence Freedman

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A nuclear test in the Nevada desert, 1955.

The surprise story to emerge just before Donald Trump began his meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in South Korea on 30 October was that the US was to resume nuclear testing. This perplexed the Chinese, who wondered if this was something to do with them, but the question was not raised when the two leaders met. It also perplexed US officials who appear to have had no warning of this announcement. And it certainly perplexed those who follow these matters as Trump’s announcement appeared to be based on a misapprehension about what other nations are doing and made little strategic or practical sense. Fred Kaplan described it as ‘pure mishmash’.

This is what Trump posted :

The United States has more Nuclear Weapons than any other country. This was accomplished, including a complete update and renovation of existing weapons, during my First Term in office. Because of the tremendous destructive power, I HATED to do it, but had no choice! Russia is second, and China is a distant third, but will be even within 5 years. Because of other countries testing programs, I have instructed the Department of War to start testing our Nuclear Weapons on an equal basis. That process will begin immediately.

As is often the case with some of Trump’s more dramatic announcements did not betray extensive staff work or fact-checking.

Every sentence is problematic. Russia has more nuclear weapons than the US, because of its substantial arsenal of short and medium-range weapons. The renovation of the US nuclear arsenal began under the Obama administration, and it was about replacement not addition. China is working hard to catch up with the US and Russia but it won’t be there by 2030. No other country is currently testing weapons. So what is meant by ‘equal basis?’ The US can’t test immediately, and if it could that would be the responsibility of the Department of Energy and not the Pentagon. Other than those issues he’s spot on.

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment

Toplines

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Ukrainian forces marginally advanced during recent counterattacks north of Pokrovsk as Russian forces continue to infiltrate into Pokrovsk and east of Myrnohrad (east of Pokrovsk). Geolocated footage published on October 31 indicates that Ukrainian forces recently marginally advanced in eastern Rodynske (north of Pokrovsk).[1] Additional geolocated footage published on October 30 shows Ukrainian forces striking Russian positions in northern Pokrovsk and in eastern Rih (immediately east of Pokrovsk) after what ISW assesses to be an infiltration mission.[2] ISW assesses that these infiltration missions did not change the control of terrain or the forward edge of the battle area (FEBA). A source reportedly affiliated with Ukrainian military intelligence stated on October 29 that Russian forces are infiltrating Pokrovsk in groups of five to 10 people and that Pokrovsk is mainly a contested “gray zone.”[3] The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) claimed that elements of the 2nd Combined Arms Army (CAA, Central Military District [CMD]) are advancing within Pokrovsk, including near the Pokrovsk railway station in central Pokrovsk, and that elements of the 5th Motorized Rifle Brigade (51st CAA, formerly known as the 1st Donetsk People’s Republic Army Corps [DNR AC], Southern Military District [SMD]) are advancing in Myrnohrad.[4] Russian milbloggers also claimed that Russian forces are advancing further in Pokrovsk and into eastern Myrnohrad and near Rodynske.[5] Another Russian milblogger claimed that elements of the 41st CAA (CMD) advanced west of Pokrovsk toward Hryshyne and advanced to the M-30 Pokrovsk-Pavlohrad highway.[6] The porous nature of the frontline and pervasiveness of drones in this area continues to complicate and obscure the tactical picture in Pokrovsk, and ISW will provide an updated assessment as the situation becomes clearer.

Ukraine lands special forces in embattled Pokrovsk, sources say

Yuliia Dysa and Tom Balmforth

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Item 1 of 2 A still image taken from a video released on Friday (October 31) and shared with Reuters by a Ukrainian military source was said to show a helicopter and troops deployed in the eastern city of Pokrovsk, Ukraine. Video shared by Ukrainian Military source/Handout via REUTERS

[1/2]A still image taken from a video released on Friday (October 31) and shared with Reuters by a Ukrainian military source was said to show a helicopter and troops deployed in the eastern city of Pokrovsk, Ukraine. Video shared by Ukrainian Military source/Handout via REUTERS Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab

Summary

Operation overseen by military spy chief, source says

Open-source map says half of the city is contested

Video shows military dismounting from helicopter

KYIV, Oct 31 (Reuters) - Ukraine landed special forces to fight in embattled parts of the eastern city of Pokrovsk earlier this week, just as Russia said it had surrounded Kyiv's forces in the area, two Ukrainian military sources said on Friday.

The operation shows how Ukraine is battling to stabilise the situation in the strategically important city after scores of Russian troops breached its perimeter this month. Russia's capture of Pokrovsk, an important road and rail hub, could enable further advances into the eastern Donetsk region, which Russia

Ukraine Gamifies the War: 40 Points to Destroy a Tank, 12 to Kill a Soldier

Drone teams compete to ascend a scoreboard that rewards units for successful attacks. Ukrainian officials say the contest helps keep soldiers motivated.

Kim Barker and Oleksandra Mykolyshyn

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Reporting from near Kharkiv, Ukraine, and from Kyiv

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The Ukrainian drone zeroed in on the two Russian soldiers riding a motorcycle just after 9 a.m. on July 19, closer and closer, until it swooped down to hit its mark and the camera went dark.

It was a high-value target for the drone operator’s regiment: worth as many as 24 points, to be exact. In a real-world game run by the Ukrainian government, regiments are being rewarded with points for successful attacks.

Wound a Russian soldier? Eight points. Kill one? That is good for 12. A Russian drone pilot is worth more: 15 points for wounding one, and 25 points for a kill. Capturing a Russian soldier alive with the help of a drone is the jackpot: 120 points.

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Russian activity increasing around key Ukrainian town, army chief says

James Landale

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Reuters

Members of the White Angel unit of Ukrainian police officers walking in Pokrovsk in May

The commander in chief of Ukraine's armed forces has warned Russian activity is increasing around the key frontline town of Pokrovsk, saying "the situation is difficult".

General Oleksandr Syrskyi admitted Russian infantry was massing in the area and said he had visited the frontline himself for talks with key commanders.

But he said reports that Ukrainian troops had been "blockaded" there by Russian forces was "untrue" propaganda.

There have been growing reports of Russian advances around the strategic town in the Donetsk region in the east of Ukraine. It forms a key transport and supply hub and its capture could unlock Russian efforts to seize the rest of the region.

In a statement on Telegram, General Syrskyi said: "In Pokrovsk, enemy infantry, avoiding combat, is amassing in the urban area and changing locations, so the primary objective is to identify and destroy them."

He added: "The situation is difficult, but Russian propaganda claims about the alleged 'blockade' of the Ukrainian Defence Forces in Pokrovsk, as well as in Kupiansk, are untrue."

He said commanders were having to maintain "a reasonable balance between goals and capabilities."

"The main priority is preserving the lives of our soldiers," he added.

Russian forces have been trying to seize Pokrovsk for more than a year. Taking it would give them a path towards taking the two biggest cities still controlled by Ukraine in the region - Kramatorsk and Sloviansk.

Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Russia's chief of general staff, Gen Valery Gerasimov, claimed earlier this week Ukrainian troops in Pokrovsk had been surrounded.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Pokrovsk was "the main target" for Russia whose forces there, he said, outnumbered Ukrainians by eight to one.

He told reporters Russia wanted to take the town to convince the United States that Ukraine was on the run.

"They do not have a result they can 'sell' to the Americans. We understand why they need Pokrovsk. They need it only to claim that Ukraine withdraws from the east and gives everything else they want," Zelensky said.

In its latest assessment, the defence intelligence firm, Sybelline, said the battle for Pokrovsk "has entered a highly dynamic and intense phase, as the Russian forces intensify their efforts to infiltrate the city and encircle Ukrainian defenders".

Deepstate, a Ukrainian monitoring group, said Russian forces were "gradually engulfing" Pokrovsk "with [their] sheer number of personnel".

General tells industry to bring more prototypes to help forces move at speed

"If we have the prototypes, prototypes can move very quickly to what we actually operate on," Marine Corps Forces Pacific Commander Lt. Gen. James Glynn said.

Mark Pomerleau 

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BAE Systems is working with the US Army to mature its M109-52 Self-Propelled Howitzer prototype as the service looks to modernize its artillery inventory. (Aaron Mehta/Breaking Defense)

WASHINGTON — One top general in the Indo-Pacific region had a message for industry: Bring more prototypes to events and exercises.

“When you come with it [a prototype], don’t come with one with the intention to take it home with you and all the data that was collected while we conducted an exercise together,” Lt. Gen. James Glynn, commander of Marine Corps Forces Pacific, said Thursday at AFCEA’s TechNet Indo-Pacific in Hawaii.

The forces want the opportunity to keep working with a system even after a set delivery or exercise to really run it through its traps.

“Come with five. Take one or two home and leave three with us and we’ll continue to work on it,” he added. We’ll give you access to all the data that’s coming off of it and we’ll do everything we can to break it with the goal of making it better.”

Glynn said in the future dynamic operating environment, the name of the game is speed. Forces don’t have time to wait for perfect solutions or the acquisition community to take years to develop something.

“Partner with us to fail. Got no problem when it doesn’t work,” he said. “If we have the prototypes, prototypes can move very quickly to what we actually operate on.”

Glynn cited the Joint Fires Network — a prototyping effort that sought to addresses the immediate needs of combatant commands for battle management and to display real-time, fused, actionable threat information to joint and partner forces — as a perfect example.

It started off as an amalgamation of prototypes that had promise and were thrown together to create a capability. It didn’t matter at the time that it wasn’t a program of record, Glynn said.

“I don’t care. It’s what we’re using, it’s what we’re going to have to use, we have to move at speed,” he said.

“What’s my biggest concern,” he added, “your ability to provide those prototypes, your trust to leave those prototypes, and our ability to continue to turn prototypes into programs of record and program a record to deliver on the timelines that we believe we need. You know the timeline. We’re working in in weeks and months, not years out here in the Indo-Pacific.”

How to Put IR Theory Into Practice

American Strategists Should Think More Like Social Scientists

Stacie E. Goddard and Joshua D. Kertzer

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American flags on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., October 2025Kylie Cooper / Reuters

STACIE E. GODDARD is Betty Freyhof Johnson ’44 Professor of Political Science and Associate Provost for Wellesley in the World.

JOSHUA D. KERTZER is John Zwaanstra Professor of International Studies and of Government at Harvard University.More by Stacie E. Goddard

More by Joshua D. Kertzer

America’s grand strategy is in turmoil. Over the past decade, power shifts, territorial disputes, and the faltering of international institutions have fueled an increasingly heated debate about what geopolitical position the United States finds itself in and the necessary trajectory of U.S. foreign policy. Some Washington analysts and policymakers (such as former U.S. Deputy National Security Adviser for Strategy Nadia Schadlow and Undersecretary of Defense Elbridge Colby) believe that after several decades of U.S. hegemony, great-power competition has returned, and Washington must embrace a foreign policy designed to counter threats from Beijing and Moscow. Others, including

Security concerns over system at heart of digital ID

Brian Wheele

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The government is facing questions over whether the system at the heart of its plans for digital ID can be trusted to keep people's personal data secure.

Digital ID will be made available to all UK citizens and legal residents but will only be mandatory for employment, under the government's proposals.

Full details of how the system will work have yet to be announced but Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has insisted it "will have security at its core".

It will be based on two government-built systems - Gov.uk One Login and Gov.uk Wallet.

One Login is a single account for accessing public services online, which the government says more than 12 million people have already signed up to.

By this time next year that might be as many as 20 million, as people registering as company directors will have to verify their identity through One Login from 18 November.

No digital ID checks until you change jobs, says No 10

What is the plan for digital IDs and will they be mandatory?

Government to consult on digital IDs for 13-year-olds

Gov.UK Wallet has not yet been launched but it could eventually allow citizens to store their digital ID - including name, date of birth, nationality and residence status, and a photo - on their smartphones.

Users will need a Gov.UK One Login to access the wallet.

Last month, the government launched a digital identity card for military veterans to test the concept.

The government hopes to avoid security issues by keeping the personal details to be accessed through One Login in individual government departments rather than in a single, centralised database.

But veteran civil liberties campaigner and Conservative MP David Davis has raised concerns about potential flaws in the design and implementation of One Login that he says could leave it - and the new digital ID scheme - vulnerable to hackers.

Speaking in a Westminster Hall debate earlier this month, he said: "What will happen when this system comes into effect is that the entire population's entire data will be open to malevolent actors - foreign nations, ransomware criminal

The Internal Proportionality Assessment in Cyberspace

Robert Kolb, Margaux Germanier 

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The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia’s Prosecutor v. Prlić et al. Appeals Chamber judgment, as well as the Eritrea-Ethiopia Claims Commission’s Western Front arbitral award found that a bridge and an electrical power station, respectively, were military objectives in their entirety, although they simultaneously served both military and civilian purposes. In a similar manner, several States consider that objects composed of both military and civilian parts are military objectives in their entirety, meaning that they can be made the object of an attack. This is evident, for example, in the military manuals of the United States (p. 217, 1034), United Kingdom (p. 54), Australia (p. 5-7), New Zealand (p. 8-10), and Denmark (p. 300).

According to this view, when assessing proportionality, commanders confronted with a military objective that also serves a civilian purpose must consider the expected incidental harm to civilians and civilian infrastructure occurring outside the target. However, there is no requirement for the commander to assess the incidental harm resulting from curtailing the civilian use of the targeted object itself.

The experts who drafted an International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) report on proportionality defined “external proportionality” as “harm to civilians or objects other than the dual-use object targeted … whether or not the targeted object was a dual-use object or an object used solely for military purposes” (p. 39). Conversely, “internal proportionality” is a balance between the potential military advantage gained and the expected civilian harm obtained by the “destruction of the civilian part of the object” or by the “ending [of] its civilian use or function.” In short, external proportionality goes only to the loss of life, injury, or destruction of objects outside the targeted objective, whereas internal proportionality concerns the impairment of the civilian functions of the attacked object itself. The first is assessed according to one or more steps of causation (the destruction of object X also impacts object Y in the surroundings; or reverberating effects), the second requires zero steps of causation (object X alone).

More precisely, there are two types of “internal” proportionality, one in the narrower and one in the larger sense. First, regarding the narrow category, the civilian activities take place inside the attacked object, and its impairment renders these activities more difficult or impossible. Thus, if a hospital is targeted because it is a military objective, its destruction will impede the use of the place to take care of the wounded and sick civilians, who in turn may die. Second, from a broader perspective, the civilian activities take place outside the attacked object, but they are based on the contribution this object makes to their functioning.