Pakistan–Afghanistan Escalation Signals Shift from Proxy Conflict to Open Hostilities

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Tensions between Pakistan and Afghanistan turned into open hostilities on Friday after a prolonged period of escalating cross-border violence that is rooted in decades of unresolved disputes and militant activity. The latest phase began when Pakistani forces launched airstrikes against what this France24 report describes as “key military installations of the Afghan Taliban regime,” marking a shift from proxy conflict to direct confrontation. The DW News video below provides expert discussion on the background that led to the current conflict.

France24 also reports that Pakistani Defense Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif framed the action in severe terms, declaring that “now it is open war between us and you,” and also accused Kabul of turning Afghanistan into a hub that “gathered all the terrorists of the world in Afghanistan and began exporting terrorism.” Pakistan justified the escalation by citing a surge of militant attacks that it has linked to actors operating from Afghan territory. Analysts speaking to DW News assessed the shift as “decisive,” noting that when one country attacks another’s armed forces inside its borders, “that’s a war”.

China Is Winning by Waiting

Kyle Chan

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One of the greatest advantages the United States has over China has been its soft power—the ability to persuade other countries, particularly allies and partners, to go along with its wants without having to resort to coercion. For decades, other countries have made sacrifices on behalf of the United States because they believed they were better off working with Washington than Beijing in the long run. This was the ultimate win-win for the United States and its partners. Together, they prospered through collective defense, integrated markets, and coordinated action on common challenges, including dealing with China.

U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened to put an end to much of that cooperation. The United States, once the bedrock of the international system, is now a major source of geopolitical instability. Trump launched a global trade war, slapping tariffs indiscriminately on allies and adversaries alike and bullying longtime partners. He ordered the capture of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro, raising fears that sovereign rules no longer apply, and has repeatedly threatened to seize allied territories.

Are China’s ‘AI tigers’ cheating? US rival Anthropic alleges some are

John Liu

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United States artificial intelligence firm Anthropic is accusing three prominent Chinese AI labs of illegally extracting capabilities from its Claude model to advance their own, claiming it raises national security concerns.

The Chinese unicorns – DeepSeek, Minimax and Moonshot AI – created over 24,000 fraudulent accounts and trained their models using over 16 million exchanges with Claude, a process known as distillation, Anthropic alleged in a Monday blogpost.

CNN has reached out to DeepSeek, MiniMax and Moonshot AI for comment.

Distillation is a common method of training in the AI industry with frontier labs often distilling their own models to make cheaper versions for customers. But most leading proprietary AI model providers including Anthropic explicitly ban such practices. Claude is not available in China.

What It Will Take to Change the Regime in Iran

Behnam Ben Taleblu, 

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The Islamic Republic of Iran is, quite possibly, at its weakest point since its founding, in 1979. In June, Israeli and U.S. attacks destroyed its uranium enrichment capacity and many of its air defense systems. In December and January, the country experienced the most widespread domestic uprising since the birth of the Islamic Republic. Throughout, it has faced spiraling economic and environmental crises that it cannot fix. None of these events has knocked out the Islamic Republic. But there is no doubt it is down.

Now, U.S. President Donald Trump is threatening to attack the country. He has made it clear he has little tolerance for the regime’s efforts to rebuild its nuclear program or the extraordinarily brutal way it cracked down on protests. “If Iran violently kills peaceful protesters, which is their custom, the United States of America will come to their rescue,” he said last month. “We are locked and loaded and ready to go.” The president has since amassed U.S. air and naval assets in the region, and he is considering a variety of strike options.

Trump hits out at reports that top US general warned against attacking Iran

Bernd Debusmann Jr

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US President Donald Trump has lashed out at reports that his top military adviser had urged caution on air strikes against Iran, saying the general believes it would be "easily won".

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General Dan Caine, has warned that strikes against Iran could be risky, potentially drawing the US into a prolonged conflict, US media report.

Caine has reportedly cautioned that a military action could have repercussions across the region, potentially including retaliatory strikes by Iranian proxies or a larger conflict that would require more US forces.

In a lengthy post on Truth Social, Trump described the reports as "fake news".

"General Caine, like all of us, would like not to see war, but, if a decision is made on going against Iran at a military level, it is his opinion that it will be something easily won," the president wrote.

What the Defense Production Act Can and Can’t Do to Anthropic

Alan Z. Rozenshtein

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On Tuesday, Feb. 24, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth met with Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei and threatened to invoke the Defense Production Act (DPA) if Anthropic doesn't agree to the Pentagon’s terms by Friday. The DPA, Hegseth warned, would let the government compel Anthropic to provide its technology on the Pentagon's terms. Anthropic is resisting allowing its artificial intelligence (AI) to be used for autonomous weapons or mass surveillance—two red lines that the company has maintained since entering the defense market.

I argued last week that Congress—not the Pentagon or Anthropic—should set the rules for military AI. The DPA threat makes that case stronger. But first, it's worth understanding what the DPA can actually do here, because the answer depends entirely on what the government is demanding. The legal analysis is genuinely complicated: Different demands raise very different legal questions, and a statute whose core compulsion powers were designed for steel mills and tank factories maps awkwardly onto a dispute about AI safety guardrails.

Regime Change in Cuba Appeals to Trump but Carries Risks

Michael Crowley

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With a U.S. chokehold pushing Cuba’s economy toward potential collapse, President Trump is hoping to reach a deal with the island’s communist government to avoid chaos even if it means the leadership change long sought by many of his close allies has to wait.

Instead, Mr. Trump appears to be pursuing a version of his approach to Venezuela, whose leftist government remained in power after U.S. troops captured its president, Nicolás Maduro, in January.

On Wednesday, Cuban border guards shot and killed four Cuban nationals who departed from the United States as they approached the island’s coast in a boat. It is unclear whether the episode will affect the Trump administration’s plans.

After years of calling for Venezuela’s opposition leaders to take power, Mr. Trump has cooperated with Mr. Maduro’s successor to gain American access to the country’s oil, leaving questions about a political transition for later.

Trump Officials Seek to Break Editorial ‘Firewall’ at U.S.-Funded News Agencies

Minho Kim

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The Trump administration is seeking to limit the safeguards protecting the editorial freedom of federally funded news groups that broadcast overseas, raising concerns that it could undermine an independent source of news in parts of the world with few of them.

Two of the organizations that President Trump tried but failed to shutter, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Middle East Broadcasting Networks, earlier this month received a draft funding agreement that could give Mr. Trump’s political appointees more control over their operations.

The administration could have the power to veto their new hires for editors in chief, chief executives and members of their boards, and could unilaterally shut down parts of their news operations with a two-week notice, according to a draft of the proposal reviewed by The New York Times and two people familiar with the matter.

The proposed agreement is the latest attempt by the Trump administration to severely shrink and influence the news content of media groups that receive federal dollars.

Russian Directive Expands Internet Control

Luke Rodeheffer

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On March 1, a new directive will come into effect that grants the Russian Communications Authority (RosKomNadZor) legal means to direct and manage national internet traffic. It will coordinate with providers to maintain functionality in the event of a crisis, interruption, or cyberattack. The decision to take such measures will be made by an interagency committee formed by Russia’s Ministry of Digital Technologies, Communications Authority, and Federal Security Service (FSB) (Official Publication of Legal Acts of Russia, October 27, 2025; GoGovRu, November 18, 2025). A flurry of discussion has spread across the Russian press and social media over the past several months surrounding the new directive. Some in the Russian press took the vaguely worded directive to indicate that the state was seeking to expand RosKomNadZor’s powers to allow a potential disconnection from the global internet space for national security reasons.

What Russia’s War on Telegram Means for the West

Reagan Easter

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The Russian government escalated its information crackdown by drastically slowing down the service of Telegram, a popular Russian messaging app used by more than 100 million Russians, including government officials and soldiers. This move is deeply ironic. In its pursuit of regime security, Moscow is jeopardizing other interests: military effectiveness in Ukraine, soft power, and human capital. The United States needs a strategy to exploit those gaps and keep information flowing in.

The throttling of Telegram is the continuation of a years-long Kremlin campaign to dominate the Russian information space and insulate it from outside influence. Moscow has seized ever-greater control over the country’s traditional and social media while expanding state surveillance and pursuing a “sovereign internet.” The crackdown intensified after Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, with Moscow banning many foreign outlets and social media platforms.

Preparing for the Day After in Europe

Paul B. Stares

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Even as peace in Ukraine remains uncertain, U.S. and European policymakers should begin preparing for the postwar challenges a settlement will likely bring. Most analysts agree that any agreement will not diminish Russia’s threat to the continent—Moscow will continue testing European and transatlantic cohesion through hybrid attacks and possible military incursions, deepening preexisting divisions. To promote greater alliance cohesion and reduce the risk of renewed conflict, NATO, the European Union, and the Group of Seven should launch comprehensive reviews of their long-term strategies toward Russia to bolster deterrence and restore stability to Europe. It is better to plan for most likely postwar challenges now than to hope for the best when the moment arrives.

Defending Europe if Russia Steps Out of the Gray Zone

Liana Fix, Benjamin Harris

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As peace negotiations continue between Russia and Ukraine, Europe should prepare for Russia to step out of the “gray zone” of hybrid warfare activities toward more overt attacks as part of a pressure strategy on Europeans. With transatlantic trust at a historic low, Russia could use the window of opportunity and decide to conduct low-level conventional provocations against European states, for example by using military drones against civilian targets, to further undermine the alliance. Europe needs to prepare to manage such a crisis on its own, without (or with less of) its traditional U.S. backing.

Right-Sizing the Russian Threat

Thomas Graham

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Europe fears Russia could launch another attack within five years. It has good reason for vigilance: Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly threatened countries that support Ukraine. Weighing against a deliberate attack, however, are serious domestic and foreign challenges for Russia, including the need to revitalize the nonmilitary segment of its economy, increase investment in advanced technologies, reintegrate hundreds of thousands of veterans into civilian life, reconstruct the devastated Ukrainian land it has seized, and rebuild its position in the former Soviet space. The Kremlin’s desire to normalize relations with the United States to offset Russia’s excessive reliance on China makes a deliberate attack even less likely. Those objective restraints should temper Putin’s ambitions, but they cannot eliminate the danger. Europe’s Russia policy should rest on two pillars: deterrence and dialogue. With sustained investment in deterrence and dialogue, and a clear-eyed understanding of the constraints Russia faces, Europe could use the next five years to consolidate a competitive, uneasy, but stable coexistence with Russia.

Strategic Snapshot: Four Years Since the Start of Russia’s Full-Scale Invasion of Ukraine

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Today, February 24, marks four years since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, as Russia’s war against Ukraine—which began in 2014—enters its thirteenth year. The Ukrainian people and their military, with support from allies and partners, have withstood Russia’s unjustified, unprovoked, and brutal assault on Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, while Russian officials are pressuring Ukraine to accept a peace deal on the Kremlin’s own terms.

The Looming Taiwan Chip Disaster That Silicon Valley Has Long Ignored

Tripp Mickle

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Federal officials have for years tried to wean Silicon Valley from its dependence on Taiwan, an island democracy roughly the size of Maryland that makes 90 percent of the world’s high-end computer chips.

In secret briefings held in Washington and Silicon Valley, national security officials warned executives from companies like Apple, Advanced Micro Devices and Qualcomm that China was making plans to retake Taiwan, which Beijing has long considered a breakaway territory. A Chinese blockade of Taiwan, the officials said, could choke the supply of computer chips made on the island and bring the U.S. tech industry to its knees.

Onetime Russian ‘War Beneficiaries’ Face Rising Uncertainty

Kassie Corelli

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The Kremlin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine changed the structure of Russian society. This restructuring affected Russian elites, including through the colossal redistribution of property through nationalization. Forbes Russia reported that in 2025, assets worth over 3 trillion rubles (around $39.2 million) were transferred to state ownership, 4.5 times more than in 2024. Moscow typically takes ownership of companies for resale (Forbes.ru, December 22, 2025). State seizure of companies is typically the result of charges for violating privatization procedures, corruption, and involvement in “extremist” activities. Dmitry Kamenshchik—a billionaire and one of the richest individuals in Russia—had his ownership of Domodedovo Airport seized in June 2025. The state deemed the airport a “strategic” enterprise, prompting concerns about foreign investments and Kamenshchik’s Turkish and United Arab Emirates citizenships (Forbes.ru, December 22, 2025). The state also alleged financial misconduct (Izvestiya; SAPA, June 17, 2025). On January 29, the Russian government sold the airport for about half of its valuation to Perspektiva, a subsidiary of Moscow’s Sheremetyevo International Airport, which is controlled by Arkady Rotenberg, a close associate of Russian President Vladimir Putin (RBC, January 29; The Moscow Times, February 3).

The Pentagon’s battle with Anthropic is really a war over who controls AI

Bryan Walsh

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Maybe that’s why he has chosen a Hollywood-esque high noon — or, at least, late afternoon — showdown for his deepening dispute with the AI company Anthropic. Hegseth has given Anthropic until 5:01 pm on Friday to respond to his demands that the company give the US military full and unfettered access to its AI, or face consequences that could threaten its survival. Anthropic has so far refused, and on Thursday evening CEO Dario Amodei said in a statement that the company “cannot in good conscience accede to their request.”

What’s unfolding this week is the biggest confrontation between the US government and a tech company over AI ethics since Google employees rebelled against working with the Pentagon in 2018. But with AI far more advanced and far more essential to both the American economy and American defense than it was eight years ago, the stakes now are much greater — certainly for Anthropic itself, but also for the question of just who has final control over an existential technology. (Disclosure: Future Perfect is funded in part by the BEMC Foundation, whose major funder was also an early investor in Anthropic. They do not have any editorial input into our content.)

iPhone is secure enough for classified NATO secrets right out of the box

Ed Hardy

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The iPhone and iPad are the first consumer devices to meet the information assurance standards set by NATO member nations. As a result, the devices can be used to handle classified information up to the NATO Restricted level without the need for specialized software or additional configuration, the company announced Thursday.

“Apple has built the most secure devices in the world for all its users, and those same protections are now uniquely certified under assurance requirements for NATO nations — unlike any other device in the industry,” said Ivan Krstić, Apple’s vice president of Security Engineering and Architecture.

If AI Can Write Everything, Why Do We Still Need Human Writers?

Worldofdrama

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I will not start my writing with lame excuses like why we need human writers ,because of thoughts and emotions that only humans provide , no that’s not the only reason , but before sharing my thoughts , first we need to understand what actually AI is doing

AI is not thinking.

It is not sitting somewhere having ideas.

It is not suddenly getting creative at 2 AM.

AI is just predicting the next word based on patterns.

What leaders need to know about building tech resilience amid geopolitical risk

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For decades, globalization shaped the technology function around efficiency, scale, and cost and drove global architectures, talent models, and vendor ecosystems. Today, those foundations are under increasing strain.

“Geopolitical dynamics have changed significantly over the last two to three years,” says Pankaj Sachdeva, a senior partner at McKinsey. “If you combine geopolitical risk, increasing cyber risk, and ongoing east–west decoupling in supply chains, you create a very dynamic and fluid environment where security risks are harder to predict and manage—materially changing the risk landscape for enterprises.”

Reflecting this shift, McKinsey’s Geopolitics Practice has identified technology, security, and IP as one of the ten key geopolitical drivers that business and IT leaders should systematically and continually assess as they seek to safeguard operations and capture new opportunities.

Ukraine’s new world of warfare

Peter Caddick-Adams

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This year marks the fourth anniversary of Vladimir Putin’s ‘Special Military Operation’ into Ukraine. It was expected to take ten days. The professional Russian soldiers in the vanguard of the invasion were told they’d be welcomed with open arms. Consequently, leading battalions carried few rations, spare parts, or fuel. Officers were instead ordered to pack their best uniforms, swords and medals for the victory parade they were assured would happen shortly in Kyiv.

Within a year, Ukrainian forces had conducted two counteroffensive operations, rolling back Russian positions, in the south at Kherson and the northeast around Kharkiv. These cost the Kremlin men like 21-year-old Nikita Loburets, a professional squad leader in the special forces brigade of the GRU, Russia’s military intelligence. He had always wanted to be a soldier, studied martial arts and learned how to parachute-jump before leaving school in Bryansk. One of his country’s irreplaceable elite soldiers, he perished in the fighting around Kharkiv, being awarded a posthumous award for bravery. Ukraine’s casualty lists, illuminated by flickering candles, have been erected inside every church, along with portraits of the deceased, proudly captured in their best uniforms. They contain many men of a similar age and background to their Russian counterparts. They might have been brothers in arms, in a different time and place.

Golden Dome will fail without software-defined warfare

Ryan Frigm

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If the United States wants to defend the homeland against the next generation of missile and aerial threats, hardware alone will not save us.

Sensors, radars and interceptors are necessary but no longer sufficient. The decisive advantage for Golden Dome for America will come from software and the ability to integrate, test, adapt and fight as a single, coherent system.

But software-defined warfare will not emerge organically. The Office of Golden Dome for America must serve as the change agent for this initiative. It is uniquely chartered, empowered and resourced to make these decisions for the Defense Department and the U.S. If Golden Dome is to succeed on its compressed timeline, the program office must mandate a software-defined architecture from the outset and enforce integration as the organizing principle of the program.

The Army is writing the book on using small drones in a tank formation

MEGHANN MYERS

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As the Army’s Transformation-in-Contact brigades test and help develop new technology, they’re also shaping how soldiers will be trained to use it.

At Fort Stewart, Georgia, soldiers in the 3rd Infantry Division are working on a pair of courses to certify soldiers to operate small unmanned aerial systems, part of a servicewide effort to create doctrine around using drones throughout every formation.

“3rd ID, specifically, is developing ways to qualify their operators on the different systems, and we are sending feedback back through the proper channels to big Army, to work on developing an Army-wide qualification course,” Capt. William Langley, who leads the UAS and electronic warfare element in the 2nd Armored Brigade’s 6th Squadron, 8th Cavalry Regiment, told reporters Tuesday.

Army using AI to update doctrine

Eve Sampson

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When a soldier reads a field manual, they are studying the Army’s guide on how to fight. Now, doctrine writers are using artificial intelligence to update those manuals, the service shared in a press release this week.

Leaders at the Combined Army Doctrine Directorate have started training authors on generative AI tools to speed up research and drafting, a move that reflects the military’s broader efforts to quickly push updated guidance to a force facing a rapidly-evolving battlefield.

“We have had people ask us about using AI and large language models to speed up the doctrine development process for years,” said Richard Creed Jr., the directorate’s leader. “So, when some of these tools became available, the first thing we did was figure out their capabilities,” he said.

What to Expect from AI in 2026: Q&A with William Marcellino

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William Marcellino is an expert at getting the most out of AI models. He oversees a growing portfolio of specially built tools that RAND is using to innovate, accelerate, and elevate its research.

He came to RAND as a linguist and was training computers to find patterns in words long before anyone had heard of ChatGPT or Claude. He's used them to identify Russian trolls operating in the shadows of social media, and to better understand what makes ISIS supporters tick. His latest research has analyzed how AI could develop in the coming years; what an artificial superintelligence would mean for global conflict and competition; and how China could use AI to flood social media with fake accounts.

“I love this stuff,” he said. “I use it, I'm fascinated by it, I do research on it. These AI models are very powerful, and they're very, very useful.”

Flamingo Finds its Target

Fabian Hoffmann

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On the night of 20 to 21 February, Ukraine launched several FP-5 Flamingo land-attack cruise missiles into Russia. At least one missile is confirmed to have struck the Votkinsk missile plant, a state-owned defense enterprise and one of Russia’s most important missile factories, located roughly 1,400 kilometers inside Russia from Ukraine and about 300 kilometers east of Kazan.

Ukraine has targeted Russia’s missile and long-range drone industry before, notably the Yelabuga drone production facility, using long-range drones, which appear to have caused only limited damage, however, due to the relatively low warhead yield of the systems employed. Ukraine has achieved greater success targeting parts of the missile and drone supply chain, particularly chemical precursor materials used to produce explosives and solid fuels.

War Without Soldiers: The Evolution of Warfare in the Age of Machines

James Mingus and Maggie Harris

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The forest was silent, save for the faint hum of machines cutting through the air near Kharkiv. A heavily fortified Russian position stood as an unyielding obstacle—until the machines arrived. Without a single soldier stepping into the fray, Ukraine’s 3rd Separate Assault Brigade launched an operation that would rewrite the rules of combat. Drones armed with explosives struck with pinpoint accuracy, followed by a kamikaze robot that breached the enemy’s defenses. Moments later, as another unmanned vehicle approached, Russian troops surrendered—not to humans, but to machines. This unprecedented event, where soldiers laid down their arms to robotic systems alone, was more than a tactical victory; it was a glimpse into the future of warfare.

The proliferation of robotics and autonomous systems is altering the character of modern conflict. As these technologies change how we fight, what we fight with, and how we perceive our adversaries, military professionals must adapt their tactics, technology, and mindset to ensure their actions remain decisive and set them up to win.

How the Army Should Run: Reforming Army Processes for Continuous Transformation

James Mingus and Christina Bembenek

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Starting in 1997, every major at the Army’s Command and General Staff College received a multihour course on “How the Army Runs,” accompanied by a five-hundred- page tome. Within minutes of departing Ft. Leavenworth, nearly all officers had flushed that high-level, complicated staff knowledge from their brains, abandoned their copies of the book to a moving carton, and went back to leading troops—and then ten years later they arrived at the Pentagon and wished they had paid more attention.

But even if they had retained the book knowledge, the way the Army actually runs changes with constantly shifting policies and regulations. The basic framework for how the Army runs is over fifty years old, but the way we design, develop, and employ the force has changed—and the pace continues to accelerate. Continuous transformation requires streamlined, flexible, automated processes that allow the Army to design and build the force we need today, informed by experimentation in the field, as well as plan for the force required to stay ahead of rapidly advancing threats we cannot forecast. Getting this right is one of the most important tasks we can accomplish for our Army.

Ukraine is reshaping the armored battlefield. The US Army is trying to keep up.

Eve Sampson

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FORT STEWART, Ga. — Spc. Lathan Thomley enlisted in the Army to become a cavalry scout. Now, he spends hours practicing on a laptop simulator before piloting drones over Fort Stewart’s training area.

Thomley is part of 2nd Armored Brigade Combat Team’s Transformation in Contact initiative, or TIC, where junior soldiers on the ground are at the forefront of experimenting with new drone capabilities and helping to drive the direction of Army doctrine from the ground up.

In armored brigades built around tanks and heavy firepower, the approach reflects how lessons from Ukraine are pushing leaders to rethink how formations move and survive on a battlefield saturated with aerial surveillance.

Selected internally, soldiers at Fort Stewart say operators start on everyday computer simulation programs before transitioning to real flights.

Political, Psychological, and Cognitive Warfare in an Asymmetric Conflict Environment

Shota Gvineria

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Four years into Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine, the conflict has reached a condition of strategic deadlock defined by clear military limits. Russia cannot achieve its maximalist objective of occupying and controlling all of Ukraine through military force, nor can it credibly secure even a minimum threshold for decisive military victory, defined as full control and consolidation of the five regions it claims as its own. At the same time, Ukraine is unable to attain its ultimate objective of expelling all Russian forces from its internationally recognized borders, or even the more limited outcome that would qualify as victory from Kyiv’s perspective: Russia’s return to its pre-2020 positions. The war has therefore entered a phase of political warfare in which outcomes will be decided primarily outside the battlefield.

The Politics of Asymmetric Equilibrium

The strategic deadlock that defines the war in Ukraine is a characteristic feature of contemporary warfare between adversaries, even when capabilities and constraints are clearly, but not decisively asymmetric. In such conflicts, the absence of decisive military superiority shifts the center of gravity toward nonmilitary instruments of power. Technological adaptation, precision strike capabilities, drones, cyber domain, and information operations allow opposing sides to compensate for conventional disadvantages and redefine battlefield outcomes. As a result, military force increasingly serves to shape bargaining positions rather than to deliver conclusive outcomes.

Escalation Dynamics Under the Nuclear Shadow—India’s Approach

Rakesh Sood

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The May 2025 conflict was only the most recent in a series of wars, conflicts, skirmishes, and crises that have afflicted India-Pakistan relations since 1947, when India emerged as an independent nation, and a part of it, Pakistan, was carved out as a separate homeland for Muslims in the Indian sub-continent.

Three wars in 1947–48, 1965, and 1971 failed to yield a decisive outcome over the territorial dispute of Kashmir, though the 1971 war did lead to the eastern wing of Pakistan seceding and emerging as an independent Bangladesh. In 1998, both countries undertook a series of nuclear tests to emerge as nuclear weapon states, adding another dimension to their rivalry. The Kargil conflict came one year later, and then militarised crises in 2001–02, 2008, 2016, 2019, and 2025.

Can Elections Secure Nepal’s Youth Revolution?

Bibek Bhandari

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For the past 10 years, Nepal’s prime ministerial role has cycled from aging leader to aging leader. From communist strongmen Khadga Prasad Sharma Oli and Pushpa Kamal Dahal to the centrist Sher Bahadur Deuba, the trio of leaders strategically took turns to guard the position. In 2026, after the country was convulsed by protests last year, many Nepalis want a decisive shift—and a new generation of leadership.

That resolve will be tested at the ballot box on March 5, when Nepal heads into a snap election triggered by the originally peaceful, youth-led anti-corruption protest movement that began in September. The demonstration turned deadly after security forces opened fire on unarmed students, killing around 77 people during the course of two days and leading Oli to resign. Former Chief Justice Sushila Karki was sworn in to lead the interim government—becoming Nepal’s first female prime minister—on Sept. 12, and the election was called nearly two years ahead of schedule.

Japan’s National Security Reckoning

Masataka Okano

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For decades, U.S. allies operated within an international system built and maintained by the United States. Washington was committed to keeping global trade flowing, to the benefit of countries around the world. The multilateral institutions formed in the wake of World War II did not prevent war altogether, but they reinforced a norm against outright conquest. And the United States’ vested interest in its allies’ security offered assurance to Japan and other countries that they would be protected if conflict came to their shores.

National security leaders around the world knew that this system was not guaranteed to last forever. Already, in the past several years, the outbreak of deadly wars in Europe and the Middle East, escalating Chinese military activities around Taiwan and the South China Sea, the reemergence of trade wars and breakdown of global governance, and the dizzying pace of change in modern warfare—especially when it comes to drones and artificial intelligence—all required countries to adjust their expectations. The world was becoming a more dangerous, more unpredictable place. Yet Japan and its partners believed that the rules-based international order, upheld at the initiative of the United States, was still the best remedy to these problems.

Cognitive Deterrence: How Taiwan Is Learning to Govern Resistance

Erika Lafrennie

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Modern conflict no longer begins with force. It begins with cognition—with the shaping of perception, the conditioning of expectations, and the quiet management of what populations come to regard as normal, inevitable, or futile. This reality is now broadly acknowledged across defense, intelligence, and policy communities. The cognitive domain is recognized as contested terrain. Influence, narrative, and sensemaking are understood as strategic tools rather than peripheral effects.

What remains unresolved is how deterrence works in this domain. In Taiwan, that question is answered not in mobilization orders or troop movements, but in civic education programs, civil defense normalization, and public messaging designed to condition expectations long before a crisis.

China’s Fragile Future

Andrew J. Nathan

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For many years, predicting the downfall of the Chinese Communist Party was something of a sport among China watchers. But few serious observers today suggest that China looks unstable. Despite facing numerous challenges, including the implosion of the country’s real estate sector since 2021 and high debt loads that have bogged down local government finances, China’s political system appears strong. Chinese leader Xi Jinping has a firm hold on all the levers of power, and the country is proving to be competitive, or even dominant, in a growing number of twenty-first-century technologies, such as electric vehicles and biotechnology. Moreover, scholars consistently find overwhelmingly high levels of public support for the CCP. In comparison to the growing fragility and divisiveness of political systems elsewhere, including in the United States, the Chinese regime appears to the outside world as competent and stable—an image that Beijing is eager to project.

Two new books challenge this view. In Political Trust in China, the political scientist Lianjiang Li digs deep into survey methodology to question the way that most scholars have measured public support for leaders in Beijing. He concludes that citizens’ trust in the regime is weaker than other researchers believe. In Institutional Genes, the economist Chenggang Xu uses a sweeping comparative and historical analysis of China’s political institutions to argue that the country’s inability to reform them will condemn it to economic stagnation. In Xu’s view, the kind of authoritarian rule that worked for China’s imperial dynasties is strangling its modern economy.