Indian Strategic Studies: 11/08/25

8 November 2025

How Afghanistan Became India’s Gateway to Central Asia

Vlad Paddack, and Eldaniz Gusseinov

Afghanistan’s break with Pakistan has created a strategic window for India.

Afghanistan’s trade and diplomacy are shifting in unexpected ways that reflect broader regional realignments. Four years after India shut its Kabul embassy following the Taliban’s return, bilateral trade has nearly rebounded to pre-2021 levels—even as Afghanistan’s trade through Pakistan collapses. This reversal highlights Pakistan’s waning leverage and India’s quiet re-emergence as a key economic and diplomatic player, a trend that increasingly links Afghanistan’s revival to India’s wider westward strategic turn, with Kabul serving as New Delhi’s gateway to Central Asia.

The Revival of Afghan-Indian Trade

Before 2021, India–Afghanistan trade reached $1.33 billion, with India exporting $826 million and importing $509 million in Afghan goods. After the Taliban takeover, India’s exports plunged to $437 million in 2022–23. But by FY 2023–24, trade surged back to $997.7 million, driven by Afghan exports of dried fruits, saffron, nuts, and apples—now duty-free in India. Afghan exports reached a record $642 million, resulting in India’s first trade deficit with Kabul.

Between April 2024 and March 2025 alone, trade reached $1 billion, signaling full recovery by year’s end. Both sides are exploring Iran’s Chabahar Port, developed by India, as a means to bypass Pakistan. India also plans to reopen its Kabul embassy and expand direct flights, reflecting what Dr. Shanthie Mariet D’Souza calls a shift from “cautious engagement” to reconnecting and rebuilding ties.

Afghanistan’s Breakdown With Pakistan

While ties with India deepen, Afghanistan’s trade with Pakistan—once its economic lifeline—is collapsing. Transit trade through Pakistan dropped from $7 billion in 2022 to $2.9 billion in 2024, an almost 60 percent fall, due to Islamabad’s anti-smuggling drives, tighter customs, and frequent border closures amid rising border clashes.

Though direct bilateral trade rose modestly, Pakistan’s role as a transit hub has eroded. The decline mirrors political tensions: Islamabad accuses Kabul of harboring TTP militants, while Kabul denies it. On October 9, Pakistan launched an unprecedented airstrike on Kabul, coinciding with Taliban foreign minister Amir Khan Muttaqi’s visit to New Delhi—an unmistakable signal of shifting loyalties.

Japan Can Keep the Indo-Pacific Open and Free

Shihoko Goto

With America Stepping Back, Tokyo Should Step Up

Containers on a cargo ship in Tokyo, April 2025 Kim Kyung-Hoon / Reuters

SHIHOKO GOTO is Director of the Asia Program and Vice President of Programs at the Foreign Policy Research Institute.

As the United States rethinks its role in the international order it has championed since the end of World War II, Japan is on the frontlines of the challenge to rules-based commerce and diplomacy. For the past decade, Tokyo has promoted the idea of a free and open Indo-Pacific, which seeks to ensure that countries from the western shores of the Indian Ocean to the northern reaches of the East China Sea can pursue economic growth without compromising their autonomy by relying too heavily on China. The policies associated with this idea, which include ensuring freedom of navigation in the Indian and Pacific Oceans, peacefully resolving geopolitical conflicts, and establishing common rules to govern trade, have made Japan a stabilizing force in the region. The framework of a free and open Indo-Pacific has also encouraged advanced economies, including the United States, to maintain their military and economic engagement with the region.

But Japan’s ability to promote a viable alternative to a regional order centered on Beijing has been faltering. Japan is on its fifth prime minister in as many years and, in the most recent elections, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party lost its majority in both houses of parliament. Pursuing a foreign policy vision has taken a back seat to navigating domestic politics. Meanwhile, the allure of the development programs that China can offer is growing as countries throughout the region struggle to find new sources of economic growth.

Japan is now in a unique position to reenergize its vision of a free and open Indo-Pacific. Its newly elected prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, is the self-proclaimed successor to Shinzo Abe, the former prime minister who proposed the free and open Indo-Pacific idea in 2016. In her first weeks in office, Takaichi has made clear that embracing this vision will be part of her commitment to carrying on Abe’s legacy. Takaichi, like Abe, has sought to position Japan as the United States’ trusted guide to the region and convince U.S. leaders that it is in their interest to have the United States remain an Indo-Pacific power and support Japan’s strategic vision.

US–China Trade Truce Redux: Risks Behind the Busan Deal

Paulo Aguiar

The Busan framework agreement between the United States and China, announced after their summit in South Korea, marks a temporary pause in their long and often tense trade and economic conflict. It eases immediate financial and political pressures on both sides by lowering tariffs and suspending some export restrictions. Yet the deal does not address the deeper sources of tension that have fueled years of confrontation between the world’s two largest economies.

In effect, the framework offers a breathing space rather than a solution. China benefits by regaining flexibility and preserving control over key strategic resources, while the United States gains short-term political relief and modest economic stability as it approaches the 2026 midterm elections. Both sides keep the ability to interpret and enforce the agreement as they see fit, which almost guarantees that new disputes will arise.

The next year is likely to be defined by “managed instability.” The two countries will cooperate just enough to avoid a breakdown but will continue to view one another as strategic competitors. Businesses and global markets will see temporary calm but remain wary of another escalation. The deeper technological, political, and strategic rivalries that shape US–China relations remain fully intact.

What Happened

On October 30, 2025, President Donald Trump and President Xi Jinping met in Busan, South Korea, to halt a renewed spiral of tariffs and trade barriers that had built up throughout the year. Both leaders faced strong domestic pressure to avoid another economic shock—Trump from US farmers and manufacturers frustrated by high tariffs, and Xi from a slowing Chinese economy affected by weakened exports and tight US trade controls.

The resulting “Busan framework” is a one-year agreement aimed at easing tensions:The United States agreed to reduce its 20% tariff on Chinese imports linked to fentanyl concerns to 10% and to suspend a threatened 100% tariff increase on Chinese goods. Washington also paused an investigation into Chinese shipping practices and suspended certain restrictions on Chinese-owned firms that had been placed on the US Entity List for one year.

The Inside Story of How Gen Z Toppled Nepal’s Leader and Chose a New One on Discord

The revolution started on social media. It ended with protests, violence, and an online poll to pick the new prime minister.

Tulsi Rauniyar

At 11:30 pm on Tuesday, September 9, Rakshya Bam stepped down from an army jeep outside military headquarters in a pitch-dark, locked-down Kathmandu. The 26-year-old hadn’t slept in more than a day. Her eyes were red-rimmed and glassy, the whites threaded with thin lines of fatigue.

A wave of youth-led protests had rocked Nepal, born on Discord servers, TikTok feeds, and encrypted messaging apps. In just a few days, Bam had seen friends gunned down, watched parliament buildings smolder, and witnessed the collapse of the Nepalese government. Prime minister K. P. Sharma Oli had resigned, and the army had stepped in to try to restore order. Now, Bam was one of 10 young activists who had been summoned to an unprecedented meeting.

As she walked through the gates of Nepali Army headquarters, flanked by soldiers in full combat gear, Bam could feel her phone buzzing in her pocket. Online, misinformation was spreading fast. Bam’s phone barely stopped buzzing. “The king is here.” “The army has staged a coup.” Discord was alive with chatter. Diplomats were calling, urging, “Save democracy!”

Inside a sterile meeting room—no phones allowed—the 10 Gen Z activists were greeted by Army General Ashok Raj Sigdel, a stern-looking man in a crisp dark green uniform, medals gleaming on his chest. For three hours, Sigdel questioned the protesters on their motives and their backgrounds. Finally, he presented them with an ultimatum. It had been their youth-led movement that had sparked the protests, he said, so they were the ones responsible for shaping the interim government. Just days earlier, these activists had been ordinary young people, lost in the grind of their daily lives. Now they were being asked to help choose Nepal’s next prime minister.

China is already dominating the data war in the Pacific, experts say 'Lack of focus' is slowing needed change at the Pentagon, a former acting SecDef says.

Jennifer Hlad

HONOLULU—Nine months into the second Trump administration, an acting defense secretary from President Trump’s first term said he thought “we’d be a lot further along” toward a nimbler military.

“I’m seeing a lot of marketing coming out of the department, and not a lot of outcomes,” Chris Miller said during a panel at the AFCEA TechNet Indo-Pacific conference last week.

Miller, who served as acting defense secretary from November 2020 to January 2021, said today’s Pentagon leaders are taking “an approach where if you have experience inside the Beltway, somehow you’re suspect and not worthy. And what I’m seeing are a bunch of like, quote-unquote brilliant business people that do not understand the plumbing of the most bureaucratic, Byzantine organization, probably since [the] Byzantine [Empire], and we’re losing opportunities because there’s a lack of focus.”

Amid a shift in national security strategies from the Indo-Pacific to the southern border, the former Special Forces colonel also criticized the push to focus on one adversary or challenge at a time. “Where’s the leadership? We spend a trillion dollars a year on national security. We can do more than one thing.”

Miller offered his comments during a discussion on ubiquitous digital surveillance in the region, where Sean Berg, a former deputy commander of Special Operations Command Pacific, said China “is already in phase three of that war: dominate” while “we still think of ourselves in phase zero: shaping.”

But when quantum decryption becomes practical, Berg said, China will be able to read untold oceans of once-secure messages that it has intercepted and filed away, then use them to gain unprecedented understanding of the patterns of U.S. forces.

“Whoever gets quantum first and is able to use that metadata to go back and figure out and predict every single move that the U.S. is about to make, whether it's an air crew landing and going to the same hotel, whether it is the fleet gearing up, and all the Copenhagen being bought out from 7-Eleven from a Ranger battalion,” he said.

The challenge of open data and ubiquitous surveillance is particularly relevant in the Pacific, where Rob Christian, the former command chief warrant officer for 311th Signal Command, pointed out that China “is the largest technically advanced enemy we’ve ever seen and could imagine, and they also own the majority of the infrastructure.”

Twenty years ago, operators could use burner phones, get local SIM cards, or even turn phones off to “hide in the noise.” But “hiding in the noise now is much more difficult when you think about the layer of AI and analytics on top of things that are out there and all the stuff we’ve dumped out there through our travels,” Christian said. “I think the challenge is slowly kind of morphing into, ‘OK, you’ve got to project, but you’ve also got to protect’.”

China Started Separating Its Economy From the West Years Ago

Keith Bradsher

China is able to pressure the U.S. economy, while making it harder for Washington to block China.Credit...Eric Lee/The New York Times

news analysis

Two decades of sustained effort to build national self-reliance and minimize imports have antagonized trade partners but fortified what a senior adviser called Beijing’s “bulwark” against conflicts.

China is able to pressure the U.S. economy, while making it harder for Washington to block China.Credit...Eric Lee/The New York Times

President Trump has used tariffs to try to reduce American reliance on Chinese exports and prevent China’s factory overcapacity from swamping the U.S. economy. But his effort has hit an obstacle: Beijing was already well on its way to weaning its economy from the United States.

For two decades, China has systematically pursued economic self-reliance. China has been able to establish choke points to pressure the U.S. economy, while making it harder for Washington to block China.

Self-reliance has been a cornerstone of Chinese policymaking not just under Xi Jinping, the country’s top leader since 2012, but also under his predecessor, Hu Jintao.

Their program of replacing imported manufactured goods with domestic production has been costly and often inefficient. But it has left the West with dwindling leverage it can deploy during disputes.

China’s leaders have become increasingly public about emphasizing the self-reliance drive. It took a prominent place at an annual gathering of the Communist Party’s Central Committee last month, when the country’s top officials laid out a sketch of China’s next five-year plan.

“We must first and foremost intensify efforts toward achieving greater self-reliance and strength in science and technology,” Mr. Xi said in a speech.

This year, China has wielded one of its most powerful choke points — its almost complete control over the world’s supply of rare-earth metals and rare-earth magnets.

Faced with restrictions on China’s supply of rare earths, Mr. Trump last week accepted a compromise with Mr. Xi.

President Trump with China’s president, Xi Jinping, in South Korea last month.Credit...Haiyun Jiang/The New York Times

Their agreement left this year’s new U.S. tariffs for China similar to those for countries in Southeast Asia and lower than the tariffs for countries like India and Brazil, with which the United States has traditionally maintained closer relations.

China’s threat to put extremely tight controls on its rare-earth exports also helped persuade the Trump administration to suspend a policy it adopted in September to expand the number of military-related Chinese companies that Americans are not allowed to do business with.

Want to stay updated on what’s happening in China? , and we’ll send our latest coverage to your inbox.

China has gained other choke points through its policies of manufacturing self-reliance. It is the world’s dominant producer of the ingredients needed to make antibiotics and other pharmaceuticals. It is also the main producer of a lot of electrical equipment, low-end computer chips and much more.

The United States has been left with fewer options when it needs to fight back. When Washington wanted to pressure Beijing to back down on rare-earth export controls, the Trump administration threatened to restrict some of the last categories of crucial American exports that China still needs, like aircraft parts.

Chinese officials are now calling for their country to become even more self-reliant.

Will Chinese Rare Earth Mineral Bans Cripple Taiwan’s Chip Production?

Brandon J. Weichert

TSMC insists that Chinese rare earth mineral export bans will not affect its production of advanced semiconductors, and has taken concrete steps to minimize disruption.

China has played its most dangerous hand yet in the ongoing trade war: it has threatened the world with export bans on critical rare earth minerals, using its stranglehold over global markets to undermine would-be competitors.

Not to worry, says the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), the producers of the world’s most sophisticated semiconductors. TSMC insists that it has taken precautions to insulate itself from the Chinese rare earth mineral export control and that their operations will be unaffected by Chinese threats.

Even if TSMC can insulate itself from Chinese export bans on rare earth minerals, though, the fact remains that China could invade Taiwan—and knock out TSMC production lines entirely.

China Doesn’t Control All Rare Earth Minerals Everywhere

According to the government of Taiwan, the new Chinese export controls are not expected to have a major impact on the chip sector because the rare earths that China is curbing do not have to do with the rare earth minerals needed for semiconductor production. Further, Taiwan (and TSMC) source many key materials or derivatives from outside China—including from Europe, the United States, and Japan—which means dependence on Chinese exports for those specific items is reduced.

TSMC has indicated that for certain key raw materials (such as gallium and germanium) they have a buffer or alternative supply which gives them time to adjust. Plus, many of the “rare earth minerals” that get media attention are those used in magnets (for electric vehicle motors or certain defense applications). TSMC insists these are not necessarily the rare earths critical for, say, wafer fabrications at the most advanced nodes.

The Tibet Occupation at 75: An Interview with Penpa Tsering

Penpa Tsering, and James Himberger

After three-quarters of a century under Chinese occupation, Tibet still hopes for genuine autonomy.

Editors’ Note: On October 27, James Himberger, the managing editor of The National Interest, interviewed Sikyong (President) Penpa Tsering of the self-declared Tibetan government-in-exile during the latter’s visit to Washington, DC. They discussed the legacy of the Chinese occupation of Tibet, the life of the Tibetan exile community, the future prospects for Tibetan autonomy, the Dalai Lama’s succession strategy, the deterioration of Tibet’s natural environment, and even the Sikyong’s impressions of the US government shutdown. The following conversation has been edited for style and clarity.

James Himberger (JH): Sikyong Penpa Tsering, thank you for taking the time to sit down with The National Interest today during your visit to Washington, DC. Seventy-five years ago this month, in 1950, troops under the leadership of Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Party entered Tibet and began an occupation of the region that persists to this day. Nine years later, the Dalai Lama fled to India and established a self-declared government-in-exile, which would later become the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) in 2011. What are the goals of the Central Tibetan Administration?

Penpa Tsering (PT): Seventy-five years ago, on October 7, 1950, China invaded Chamdo [in Eastern Tibet]. On November 17, 1950, His Holiness, the 14th Dalai Lama, at the age of 15, had to take over the temporal and spiritual leadership of Tibet. And then, six months later, we were forced to sign the so-called 17-point agreement. His Holiness, at a very young age, tried to live under the provisions of the 17-point agreement for eight long years. Within those eight long years, His Holiness went to China in 1954–55, met with Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai, and Zhu De, all those leaders of those times. And he also witnessed how the communist government functioned. Everything looked very orderly, but there was no freedom to speak your mind.

Then, in 1956 and 1957, His Holiness was in India. India was in its nascent democracy just ten years after independence. His Holiness went to the Indian parliament, found it quite chaotic, but everybody had the freedom to speak. So, His Holiness wanted to introduce democracy [to Tibet], not even one year after coming into exile under very difficult circumstances. It has been since 1950, as you say, it’s been 75 long years. We never imagined that we would have to live in exile for this long. So one of the main responsibilities of the Central Tibetan Administration or the Tibetan government-in-exile is to resolve the Sino-Tibet conflict peacefully.

Beijing’s New Approach to Taiwan

Arran Hope

A spokesperson for the Office for International Military Coordination (OIMC) calls for Taiwan’s inevitable return. (Source: PRC Ministry of National Defense)

Executive Summary:In 2025, Beijing has intensified its approach to Taiwan across legal, military, discourse, and political dimensions.

In October, a local public security bureau opened investigation into a sitting Taiwanese lawmaker for the first time, enhancing its legal warfare tactics against the democratic state.

Purges at the top of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) may have precipitated a tactical switch away from He Weidong’s approach, which emphasized persistent gray-zone activities, toward Zhang Youxia’s expressed preference for buying time to build up military capacity.

The Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) has ramped up its media and social media presence in recent weeks, while other parts of the messaging apparatus are foregrounding the phrase “Taiwan’s inevitable return” across official media channels.

The new chair of the Kuomintang, Cheng Li-wun, has shown a willingness to engage with Beijing. She exchanged letters with General Secretary Xi Jinping, and sent a newly appointed vice chair to meet with TAO director Song Tao, who announced a “new starting point” in their relations.

Beijing sees its relationship with the United States as a key variable influencing its behavior toward Taiwan.

Beijing is shifting its approach to Taiwan. Over the course of 2025, it has intensified legal and cognitive pressure toward its small democratic neighbor, advanced a strategy of political warfare, and adapted its military posture. Several factors have informed this shift. Personnel changes within the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) may have played a role. Political developments within Taiwan also likely contributed. And behind all these considerations are the position of the United States under the new administration of President Donald Trump. As General Secretary Xi Jinping has often pointed out, U.S.-PRC relations are “one of the most important bilateral relations in the world” (世界上最重要的双边关系之一) (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, October 16, 2024).

A question remains about whether Beijing’s evolving approach constitutes a change of degree or of kind. Some of the actions taken this year, especially in the legal domain, have relied on instruments that the PRC has created over the past few years for this purpose. Shifts in military posture may similarly have as much to do with the availability of new capabilities coming—or current capabilities meeting capacity limits—than with tactical changes. Possible avenues for political influence, chiefly through the nationalist Kuomintang, similarly are just now becoming clear following the election in October of a new party chair. Whichever the case may be, the general trend of Beijing’s actions is the same: toward greater coercion and a ratcheting up of pressure across all domains.

A Five-Year Plan for Managed Confrontation

Matthew Johnson

Present at the creation: the 19th Central Committee Politburo Standing Committee codified Xi’s long-term doctrine of fusing national security with development at the 2020 Fifth Plenum, laying the strategic and institutional groundwork for the 15th Five-Year Plan’s deployment for managed confrontation. (Source: Xinhua)

Executive Summary:

Economic planning for systemic rivalry: The Fourth Plenum ratified the culmination of a decade-long project to fuse national planning, security strategy, and technological control under Xi Jinping’s direct command. The 15th Five-Year Plan (2026–2030) formalizes this system as a doctrine of strategic endurance—a framework for sustaining confrontation with the United States through centralized control of capital, industry, and information.

Dual circulation reinterpreted: What appeared in 2020 as a rebalancing toward domestic demand was in fact the source code for managed confrontation, building an economy that can circulate internally under pressure while tightening global dependence on the People’s Republic of China (PRC). “Self-reliance” thus also meant redundancy, coercive leverage, and supply-chain weaponization.

Systemic hardening, 2020–2025: Over the following half-decade, Beijing implemented this blueprint, tightening Party command over finance and platforms, deploying “reverse constrainment” through trade sanctions, and rolling out export controls on rare earths, batteries, and chipmaking equipment. These measures tested the conversion of economic scale into strategic deterrence.

Iran’s Shahed UAVs Are the Future of Warfare. Has America Noticed?

Maya Carlin

In addition to their ubiquity in Ukraine, Iranian-made Shahed drones have popped up in other conflicts—chiefly those fought against Israel by Tehran’s regional allies and proxy groups.

The US military’s need for long-range, one-way attack drones is urgent. According to US Army official Maj. Gen. James Bartholomees, the prominence of drone warfare across the globe is contributing to this increasing demand. Bartholomees, commanding general of the 25th Infantry Division, recently stated that the US Indo-Pacific Command (USINDOPACOM) was “learning from what is happening in Ukraine”—referring to the outsized role that unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have played in that conflict.

Russia’s possession of Iranian-designed lethal drones has heavily contributed to the country’s offensive war efforts against Ukraine. Both Moscow and Kyiv continue to employ drones as part of their respective efforts on the frontlines. While the US appears to be lagging behind in terms of producing lower-end UAVs for conflict, a new launched effects company being stood up by the 25th Infantry Division will work to rectify this shortcoming.

“We absolutely need to build this capability quickly,” Bartholomees said. “We need to test it in our region; we also need to work with our allies and partners to do the same.”

Iran’s Shahed UAVs Have Profoundly Reshaped the Ukraine War

Since drones are cheap to manufacture and provide lethal aerial impact at a fraction of the cost of conventional aircraft and missiles, their growing popularity among state and non-state actors alike makes sense. Since the onset of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Western intelligence and the Ukrainian government have confirmed the sale, delivery, training, and use of an array of Iranian-designed lethal drones by Russian forces. Images and footage depicting both the Iranian Shahed-136 and Shahed-131 lethal drones used in Russian-launched attacks targeting energy and civilian infrastructure in Ukraine have been well documented.

The Shahed series are referred to as loitering munitions or “suicide” drones. They linger around a target for some time before detonating on impact. Developed by Shahed Aviation Industries, these cheap UAVs have become one of Tehran’s most popular exports. Each drone in this series costs roughly $20,000 to $50,000, but even the most expensive of these cost only a fraction of a modern surface-to-air missile battery. The Shahed-136 is powered by the Chinese-designed MD550 engine, providing a top speed of roughly 185 kilometers (115 miles) per hour.

The Taliban’s Entry Into India-Pakistan Rivalry

Kabul’s flirt with New Delhi is a classic case of geopolitical logic.

Mohan-C-Raja-foreign-policy-columnistC. Raja Mohan

C. Raja Mohan,

A columnist at Foreign Policy and a former member of India’s National Security Advisory Board.Afghan Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi arrives at Afghanistan's embassy in New Delhi for a press conference on Oct. 12.Afghan Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi arrives at Afghanistan's embassy in New Delhi for a press conference on Oct. 12. Elke Scholiers/Getty Images

My FP: Follow topics and authors to get straight to what you like. Exclusively for FP subscribers. Subscribe Now | Log In

If geography is destiny, then nowhere is this equation more relentless than at the subcontinent’s northwestern frontier. Since the partition of British India in 1947, two patterns have held steady: hostility between Afghanistan and Pakistan, and warmth between Afghanistan and India. No matter who rules in Kabul—monarchists, communists, or various iterations of Islamists—the pattern endures. Pakistan helped create and nurture the Taliban to end these patterns once and for all; today, the Taliban are battling Pakistan and looking to India for balance.

Renewed clashes along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border in October fit perfectly within this historical rhythm. The irony is unmistakable: The same Pakistan that helped install the Taliban in power finds itself locked in an escalating conflict with them—and negotiating only through third parties.

Syria Needs a Reconstruction Plan

Without clarity on the country’s economic framework, Assad-era cronyism may reappear.

English

Yezid Sayigh

Diwan, a blog from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s Middle East Program and the Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center, draws on Carnegie scholars to provide insight into and analysis of the region. Learn More

Syria needs an economic reconstruction program. Desperately. Yet nearly a year after the fall of dictator Bashar al-Assad, there is still no talk of putting together a comprehensive economic reconstruction plan, whether in Damascus or among the obvious international stakeholders. Without clarity and wide-based consultation on the country’s new economic framework, there is a distinct risk that the cronyism of the Assad-era economy will reappear, undermining social equity and generating political discontent, and that violence will reemerge as “a central mechanism for the redistribution of power and wealth among competing forces,” as it did during the long civil war.

The new Syrian authorities have announced memorandums of understanding worth $14 billion and contracts worth billions more with foreign commercial and government entities. Yet this only underlines the absence of an integrated, overall approach to economic reconstruction, one in which the present focus on generating quick revenue through real estate schemes and leasing major infrastructure facilities to foreign investors is balanced with investment in productive sectors including industry, agriculture, and services that can generate jobs and enhance economic complementarity. Moreover, the lack of transparency when it comes to contract details, settlements with Assad-era business cronies, liquidation of Baath Party assets, and the government’s new sovereign wealth fund impedes accountability and threatens the viability of investments. The official embrace of a free-market approach lacks guardrails and is not shaped by consultation with relevant economic actors and social groups.

The absence of a comprehensive economic reconstruction plan for Syria is paradoxical. After all, it was evident during the long, brutal war that the country would need large-scale economic reconstruction. In 2012, the United Nations’ Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia launched the first major effort to prepare for reconstruction, the National Agenda for the Future of Syria, which was intended as “a platform for technical dialogue for Syrian experts” to discuss “social, economic and governance factors” in a “post-conflict Syria.” A year later, Friends of the Syrian People, an international diplomatic collective, foreshadowed reconstruction by creating a multi-donor Syria Recovery Trust Fund “to alleviate the suffering of the Syrian people” by funding essential services.

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment

Russian forces continue to advance in the Pokrovsk direction and appear to be operating with increasing comfort within Pokrovsk itself. Geolocated footage published on November 3 indicates that elements of the Russian 5th Motorized Rifle Brigade (51st Combined Arms Army [CAA], formerly 1st Donetsk People’s Republic Army Corps [DNR AC], Southern Military District [SMD]) recently advanced in southern Myrnohrad (east of Pokrovsk) and that Russian forces advanced in eastern Rodynske (north of Pokrovsk).[1] Additional geolocated footage published on November 2 shows Ukrainian forces striking two Russian servicemembers in northwestern Pokrovsk engaged in what ISW assesses was an infiltration mission that did not change the control of terrain or the forward edge of the battle area (FEBA).[2] A Ukrainian officer reported on November 3 that Russian forces continue efforts to infiltrate further into Pokrovsk and are attempting to establish observation posts and concentrate personnel within the town.[3] The Ukrainian officer stated that Russian forces are attempting to establish defenses in unspecified areas of Pokrovsk. A source reportedly affiliated with Ukrainian military intelligence reported on November 1 that Russian forces continue to infiltrate into Pokrovsk from the Zvirove-Shevchenko-Novopavlivka area (south to southwest of Pokrovsk) and are accumulating on the northeastern outskirts of Pokrovsk near Rivne and on the northern outskirts of Pokrovsk.[4] The source also stated that Russian forces are beginning to establish forward observation posts and drone operator positions as Russian forces accumulate a sufficient amount of manpower in Pokrovsk and “settle” into these positions. The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) published footage on November 3 showing Russian forces reportedly interacting with and evacuating civilians from within Pokrovsk, and Russian milbloggers claimed on November 2 and 3 that Russian soldiers are checking the documents of civilians in the town.[5]

The Slow Death of Russian Oil

Tatiana Mitrova

Why Ukraine’s Campaign Against Moscow’s Energy Sector Is Working

Rosneft office building, Moscow, October 2025 Ramil Sitdikov / Reuters

TATIANA MITROVA is a Global Fellow at the Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University.

SERGEY VAKULENKO is a Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center in Berlin.More by Sergey Vakulenko

In considering the many effects of the war in Ukraine on the Russian economy, few suspected that fuel shortages would be one of them. After all, Russia is an oil-rich country whose energy infrastructure is far from the frontlines; for most of the war, it has been Ukraine, not Russia, whose energy grid has been in the line of fire. Yet since August, when Ukraine began a concerted campaign to strike oil refineries deep inside Russia, fuel shortages have come to preoccupy Russians. By late October, Ukrainian drones had hit more than half of Russia’s 38 major refineries at least once. As a result, Russia went from processing about 5.4 million barrels of oil per day in July to processing roughly 5 million barrels per day in September. Production outages spread across multiple regions, and some Russian gas stations began rationing fuel. By late October, additional strikes, including at refineries in Ryazan and Saratov, further underscored the reach of Ukraine’s campaign.

With such results, it may be tempting to conclude that Ukraine is on the verge of breaking Russia’s oil industry. But that is not the case. Despite the serious damage they are causing, the attacks are unlikely to change Moscow’s resolve in the near term. For the time being, the Russian refining sector still has enough resilience, because of both its substantial surplus capacity as the world’s third-largest refining system and its ability to repair damaged units quickly. The Russian government also has a variety of tools it can use to maintain a relative equilibrium. Moreover, for Ukraine, there is also the risk that the campaign will cause Moscow to step up its own attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure and energy systems as the country enters the fourth winter of the war.

But the attacks on refineries could—if they can be sustained at the current pace—have far-reaching effects over the longer term. As Russian resilience is relentlessly tested, it is gradually being worn out. Although the units used to distill crude oil can be repaired relatively easily after every attack, they erode after the repeated cycles of heating and cooling caused by strikes. And as Russia’s oil industry grows more reliant on government interventions for crisis management, the energy sector will become state-managed and less efficient. In truth, the real damage caused by Ukraine’s campaign is cumulative and institutional, not physical. Even as it strives to preserve short-term stability, Russia is presiding over the acceleration of long-term decline.

The Case for Trump’s Second-Term Foreign Policy

Robert C. O’Brien

U.S. President Donald Trump speaking to reporters in West Palm Beach, Florida, October 2025 Elizabeth Frantz / Reuters

ROBERT C. O’BRIEN is Chairman of American Global Strategies, a geopolitical advisory firm. He served as U.S. National Security Adviser from 2019 to 2021.

Last year in Foreign Affairs, I outlined a framework for a second Trump administration foreign policy that would restore the “peace through strength” posture that prevailed during Donald Trump’s first term as president. This vision of “America first” stood in stark contrast to the foreign policies pursued by the Obama and Biden administrations and the approaches advocated by influential Democratic strategists during the 2024 presidential campaign. Broadly speaking, they believe that the United States is in decline, and that this process must be skillfully managed through a variety of steps: unilateral disarmament (via gradual but significant cuts to military spending that harm readiness); apologizing for putative American excesses and misdeeds (as when, in 2022, Ben Rhodes, who had served as a deputy national security adviser in the Obama administration, wrote that “historians will debate how much America might have instigated” Russian President Vladmir Putin’s aggressive acts, asking whether the United States had been “too triumphalist” in its foreign policy); appeasement (including ransom payments to Iran thinly disguised as humanitarian sanctions relief); and the partial accommodation of the desires of U.S. adversaries (as when, in January 2022, President Joe Biden suggested that Russia would face less significant consequences if it launched only a “minor incursion” into Ukraine instead of a full-scale invasion).

In 2024, having experienced 12 years of foreign policies predicated on these views, in contrast to four years of Trump’s “America first” foreign policy, the American people overwhelmingly chose strength over managed decline and went with Trump. Ever since, Trump has been using U.S. economic, diplomatic, and military power to deliver on every aspect of his foreign policy agenda. He has demonstrated that strength begets peace and security.

Why Is Trump Suddenly Talking About Invading Nigeria?

Kọ́lá Túbọ̀sún

Over the past year, a talking point about Nigeria has gradually gained a foothold in U.S. right-wing media. It spread even to relatively liberal spaces such as Real Time With Bill Maher, and has now become an official government policy. On Oct. 31, U.S. President Donald Trump instructed his cabinet to put the country in the category of “country of particular concern” and, if necessary, make plans for going in “guns-a-blazing.”

The ostensible reason: the Nigerian government’s terrible job in protecting “Christians” in its fight against bandits, terrorists, and other purveyors of insecurity.

It’s true that there has been violence against Christians in Nigeria—but they are not the only victims, nor would U.S. military intervention help. Nigeria, Africa’s largest democracy, is a multiethnic, multireligious country, with the northern part of the country mostly inhabited by Muslims and the southern part of the country mostly inhabited by Christians. But the delineation is not black and white. The middle belt, often characterized as part of the north, has a number of non-Muslim residents. In the south, Christians, Muslims, and traditional animist believers live side by side.

While the vast majority of Nigerian Muslims live peacefully with their neighbors, the country has battled a militant Muslim insurgency, Boko Haram, for at least a decade. The global #BringBackOurGirls campaign arose after the kidnapping of about 276 schoolgirls age 16-18 in April 2014 by Boko Haram militants in northeastern Nigeria. Boko Haram has been operating across Chad, Niger, Cameroon, and Mali since around 2002, but it has also carried out a number of insurgent attacks in northern Nigeria.

Explainer-Why is Russia pushing so hard to take the strategic Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk?

Andrew Osborn and Felix Hoske

artilleryman of the 152nd Separate Jaeger Brigade fires a howitzer towards Russian troops, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, near the frontline town of Pokrovsk in Donetsk region, Ukraine October 15, 2025. REUTERS/Anatolii Stepanov

©Thomson Reuters

MOSCOW/KYIV (Reuters) -Russian forces are advancing inside the eastern Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk, destroying trapped Ukrainian military formations and repelling Ukrainian efforts to break out of encirclement, the Russian Defence Ministry said on Monday.

Ukraine's top military commander Oleksandr Syrskyi, who has estimated that Russia has over 100,000 troops fighting in the area, says his forces are pushing hard to try to dislodge Russian forces and are broadly holding their ground.

Following are key facts about Pokrovsk, which Russians call by its Soviet-era name of Krasnoarmeysk, and the long battle for its control which began in earnest in mid-2024.

WHAT IS POKROVSK?

Pokrovsk is a road and rail hub in Ukraine's eastern Donetsk region with a pre-war population of some 60,000 people. Most people have now fled, all children have been evacuated and few civilians remain amid its pulverised apartment buildings and cratered roads.

Ukraine's only mine producing coking coal - used in its once vast steel industry - is around six miles (10 km) west of Pokrovsk. Ukrainian steelmaker Metinvest said in January it had suspended mining operations there.

The city lies on a key road which has been used by the Ukrainian military to supply other embattled outposts.

A technical university in Pokrovsk, the region's largest and oldest, now stands abandoned, damaged by shelling.

The Case for Trump’s Second-Term Foreign Policy

Robert C. O’Brien

Peace Through Strength Is Delivering Stability and Security

U.S. President Donald Trump speaking to reporters in West Palm Beach, Florida, October 2025Elizabeth Frantz / Reuters

ROBERT C. O’BRIEN is Chairman of American Global Strategies, a geopolitical advisory firm. He served as U.S. National Security Adviser from 2019 to 2021.More by Robert C. O’Brien

Last year in Foreign Affairs, I outlined a framework for a second Trump administration foreign policy that would restore the “peace through strength” posture that prevailed during Donald Trump’s first term as president. This vision of “America first” stood in stark contrast to the foreign policies pursued by the Obama and Biden administrations and the approaches advocated by influential Democratic strategists during the 2024 presidential campaign. Broadly speaking, they believe that the United States is in decline, and that this process must be skillfully managed through a variety of steps: unilateral disarmament (via gradual but significant cuts to military spending that harm readiness); apologizing for putative American excesses and misdeeds (as when, in 2022, Ben Rhodes, who had served as a deputy national security adviser in the Obama administration, wrote that “historians will debate how much America might have instigated” Russian President Vladmir Putin’s aggressive acts, asking whether the United States had been “too triumphalist” in its foreign policy); appeasement (including ransom payments to Iran thinly disguised as humanitarian sanctions relief); and the partial accommodation of the desires of U.S. adversaries (as when, in January 2022, President Joe Biden suggested that Russia would face less significant consequences if it launched only a “minor incursion” into Ukraine instead of a full-scale invasion).

In 2024, having experienced 12 years of foreign policies predicated on these views, in contrast to four years of Trump’s “America first” foreign policy, the American people overwhelmingly chose strength over managed decline and went with Trump. Ever since, Trump has been using U.S. economic, diplomatic, and military power to deliver on every aspect of his foreign policy agenda. He has demonstrated that strength begets peace and security.

Nuclear Means Come to Front of Putin’s Long-War Strategy

Pavel K. Baev

Executive Summary:

Russian President Vladimir Putin escalated his nuclear brinkmanship, announcing tests of new weapons, such as the Burevestnik and Poseidon weapon systems.

After these tests, U.S. President Donald Trump unexpectedly responded by ordering the United States to prepare for resumed nuclear testing “on an equal basis” with Russia and the People’s Republic of China (PRC).

Much of Putin’s nuclear posturing is aimed at eroding European solidarity with Ukraine by intensifying anti-nuclear sentiments on the continent. The strategy may backfire, however, by way of angering the United States and the PRC.

Last week was supposed to mark a significant step forward in Russia’s application of nuclear policy, which constitutes its key geopolitical asset in the 21st century. Instead, Moscow commentators were taken aback over U.S. President Donald Trump’s message on resuming nuclear testing “immediately” and also “on an equal basis” with Russia and the People’s Republic of China (PRC) (RBC, October 30). Russia’s most knowledgeable experts have not been able to discern whether the U.S. Department of Defense was ordered to execute a series of tests of nuclear devices at the Nevada test site or to expand testing of delivery systems for nuclear warheads (RIAC, October 31). It was clear that a sequence of statements by Russian President Vladimir Putin on testing new and, in his assessment, technologically unique nuclear-capable weapon systems prompted Trump to issue the ambiguous order (Meduza, October 30). It was also clear that Putin sought to solicit a very different response.

Russia Becoming a Gas Station Without Gasoline

Vadim Shtepa

Executive Summary:

Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 has led to a domestic fuel crisis, as Ukraine’s repeated drone strikes on oil facilities, as well as international sanctions, have constrained Russia’s largest industry.

In September, Russia’s gasoline production fell by almost a quarter, forcing the Kremlin to impose a ban on gasoline exports until 2026, and to seek to import gasoline from the People’s Republic of China and Belarus.

Since 2022, Ukraine has dramatically reshaped its military production industry and become a world leader in drone technology, enabling it to mass-produce drones at a significantly lower cost than Russia can repair its domestic infrastructure.

On November 3, the Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukraine struck the Saratov oil refinery for the third time this fall. The General Staff also reported strikes on multiple Russian military logistics sites the same night (Telegram/GeneralStaffZSU; The Kyiv Independent, November 3). This is just one of the latest Ukrainian strikes on critical energy infrastructure in Russia. In 2014, former U.S. Senator John McCain referred to Russia as a “gas station masquerading as a country” (Voice of America, March 27, 2014). Since the early 2000s, Moscow has actively promoted the idea of Russia as an “energy superpower,” emphasizing that the oil and gas fields left over from the Soviet era could ensure economic prosperity. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s regime, however, greatly damaged that notion with its 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The full-scale war led to international sanctions aimed at constraining the Russian economy’s ability to support the war effort, with a particular focus on targeting oil and gas companies (Radio Svoboda, October 24).

The Mamdani Era Begins His opponents tried to smear him for his youth, inexperience, and leftist politics. But New Yorkers didn’t want a hardened political insider to be mayor—they wanted Zohran Mamdani.

Eric Lach

It’s ancient history now, but when Zohran Mamdani first entertained the notion of running for mayor, he imagined himself running against Eric Adams. It was 2021, and Adams had just won a squeaker of a primary, convincing New Yorkers that what they needed in the post-COVID moment was a swaggering ex-cop who believed in good old-fashioned law and order. This summer, while I was reporting a Profile of Mamdani, Kenny Burgos, an old classmate of his from high school and a colleague in the New York State Assembly, recalled Mamdani being despondent at Adams’s victory. “He was, like, ‘Who are we going to get to run against this guy in four years?’ ” Burgos told me. “I said, ‘Why don’t you do it?’ He said, ‘I’m too young, they won’t take me seriously.’ ”

Four years later, every apprehension that Mamdani and other leftists and liberals had toward an Adams mayoralty has proved justified. The Adams administration unravelled in a spray of cartoonish corruption charges that brought to mind the old grafts of Tammany Hall; the Mayor saved himself from prosecution by cutting a deal with a newly reëlected President Donald Trump. Now, as masked federal agents snatch weeping fathers and mothers from immigration court, just a few blocks from City Hall, Adams, having dropped his campaign for reëlection, is enjoying his lame-duck period. He just went on a sightseeing trip to Albania.

Where others saw a city with no one at the wheel, Andrew Cuomo, the scowling former governor who resigned in 2021 amid sexual-harassment and abuse-of-power allegations, saw opportunity. Earlier this year, Cuomo emerged from his sister’s lavish estate in Westchester, kicked his daughter out of her apartment in midtown, and entered the mayoral race intending to win City Hall in an act of pure power politics, to remind us of his ability to bend both friends and enemies to his will. Yet his plodding and depressing campaign pleased almost no one. Cuomo barely veiled his contempt for most New Yorkers and for the grubby office of the mayor. His trash talk of Mamdani became openly Islamophobic. The day before Election Day, he bizarrely drove around the city in a white Ford Bronco, which he later clarified was similar to but not the same model as the one O. J. Simpson made famous.

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

The Quad Is Dead, Long Live the Quad

In an increasingly dangerous era, the group’s old patterns of cooperation will not suffice.

Arzan Tarapore,

A visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio meets with Japanese Foreign Minister Iwaya Takeshi at a gathering of foreign ministers of the Indo-Pacific Quad at the U.S. Department of State in Washington on July 1.U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio meets with Japanese Foreign Minister Iwaya Takeshi at a gathering of foreign ministers of the Indo-Pacific Quad at the U.S. Department of State in Washington on July 1. Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images

My FP: Follow topics and authors to get straight to what you like. Exclusively for FP subscribers. Subscribe Now | Log In

A flurry of summit meetings assembled leaders from the Indo-Pacific last week, from Kuala Lumpur to Tokyo to Gyeongju. But questions linger over one other summit meeting that was planned for this month. This year is India’s turn to host the summit meeting of the Quad, an informal grouping that brings together Australia, India, Japan and the United States; the Quad started in 2007 and lasted until 2008, and was revived during U.S. President Donald Trump’s first term. But after U.S.-India bilateral relations soured this past summer, Trump had reportedly been reluctant to attend. Recent news of a possible trade deal may clear the way for the summit to proceed. The question over the summit’s timing, or if it will even take place, reflects deeper uncertainties over the Quad’s future.

Now more than ever, however, the Indo-Pacific region needs the four countries to work together. It faces a daunting range of security hazards, from unrelenting natural disasters, to unchecked Chinese coercion of neighbors, to an unfettered Chinese arms buildup to take control of Taiwan. As American credibility looks shaky, the risk of major war is rising.

My FP: Follow topics and authors to get straight to what you like. Exclusively for FP subscribers. Subscribe Now | Log In

Putin Plans for Two More Years of War

Patrick Drennan

Wearing a military uniform, Russian President Vladimir Putin held a meeting on October 26 with his favorite subordinate General Valery Gerasimov and other commanders of the Russian forces. The recorded interview was designed to convince the Russian public that the army was making progress, and to reiterate the commitment to entirely seize the regions of Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhia, and Kherson.

While most of the post is propaganda, the Russian military is making serious advances towards the Donetsk city of Pokrovsk. They may conquer the city in the Winter campaign, but the human cost will be high - videos of destroyed Russian columns circulate on social media channels daily.

Taking Pokrovsk will just force Ukraine to use the longer northern route to supply their front lines in this area. However, Pokrovsk is just a city, and like Bakhmut and Avdiivka, other cities in the region that Russia has gradually conquered over the last three years, it will not win the war.

Beyond Pokrovsk, Ukrainian forces have created strong layered defense lines composed of minefields, bunkers, artillery systems, and strike and reconnaissance drones.

Putin cannot accept the offer from President Trump for a ceasefire on the current frontlines without losing face at home.

Firstly, he cannot justify the one million casualties to date, without any major gains. Secondly, he will not meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky because has repeatedly told the Russian people that Zelensky is “illegitimate”. Finally, without control of all of Donetsk, a bulwark of Ukrainian defense, he cannot fulfil his long-term plans of taking Ukraine in its entirety.

Armor Up Satellites for Space Superiority

Rebecca Grant

Protecting America’s critical infrastructure from cyber hacks is a never-ending problem – and not just on Earth, but on orbit, too. Space is the new frontier for cyberattacks.

America has critical infrastructure at risk in space. From low-earth orbit constellations providing services like broadband to the proliferated satellite architecture for missile warning, and of course, GPS, the U.S. is dependent on space for daily military operations and the functioning of the economy.

Where there is critical infrastructure, there are also hackers. Finding ways to attack America’s military, intelligence, and commercial satellites is a major preoccupation for adversaries.

China is already gunning for U.S. satellites. “This is the most complex and challenging strategic environment that we have seen in a long time, if not ever,” Vice Chief of Space Operations General Michael Guetlein testified to the Senate Armed Services Committee on March 12, 2025. Some attack vectors are kinetic. Picture robot arms dragging satellites to graveyard orbits. Guetlein also described a 2024 Chinese test of dogfighting satellites in space.

Non-kinetic tactics are just as menacing. Jamming, spoofing, and cyberattacks pose increasing threats. “We are at war in the cyber realm, in the non-kinetic realm,” stated Katie Arrington, who was performing the duties of the Pentagon’s Chief Information Officer.

That applies to satellites, too. Satellites over foreign territory are enticing prey. “Don’t accept commands when your satellite is flying over ‘Chiranistan,’” quipped Kyle Shepard, Chief Engineer, SNC.