Brahma Chellaney
Professor
Brahma Chellaney, Professor of Strategic Studies at the New Delhi-based Center for Policy Research and Fellow at the Robert Bosch Academy in Berlin, is the author of nine books, including ‘Asian Juggernaut’, ‘Water: Asia’s New Battleground’ and ‘Water, Peace and War: Confronting the Global Water Crisis’.
Europe's Russia sanctions are a shot in the foot
It seems obvious that sanctions -- an increasingly important tool of Western foreign policy -- should inflict significant pain on the target without exacting unsustainably high costs from the country imposing them. But the European Union's sanctions on Russia -- intended to punish the country for its brutal war of aggression against Ukraine -- do not meet this condition.
Of debt and bondage with Beijing
Recently released details of Kenya's 2014 loan agreement with China to finance a controversial railway project have once again highlighted the predatory nature of Chinese lending in developing countries. The contract not only imposed virtually all risk on the borrower (including requiring binding arbitration in China to settle any dispute), but also raised those risks to unmanageable levels (such as by setting an unusually high interest rate). With terms like that, it is no wonder some countries around the world have become ensnared in sovereignty-eroding Chinese debt traps.
US-India ties too important to be neglected
The upcoming joint military exercise between the US-India known as War Practice, in a high-altitude area less than 100 kilometres from India's border with China, highlights the partnership's growing strategic importance. India holds more annual military drills with the US than any other country, as the two powers seek to improve their forces' interoperability.
No justification for engaging with Taliban
In the year since the United States' disgraceful abandonment of Afghanistan to the Taliban, the country has gone down precisely the path any logical observer would have predicted: a medieval, jihadist, terrorist-sheltering emirate has been established. The US will incur costs for betraying its Afghan allies for a long time to come. But nobody will pay a higher price than Afghans.
The dramatic fall of the House of Rajapaksa
For much of nearly two decades, the four Rajapaksa brothers and their sons have run Sri Lanka like a family business -- and a disorderly one, at that. With their grand construction projects and spendthrift ways, they saddled Sri Lanka with unsustainable debts, driving the country into its worst economic crisis since independence. Now, the dynasty has fallen.
A declining America is focusing on the wrong enemy
Much of the democratic world would like the United States to remain the pre-eminent global power. But with the US apparently committed to strategic overreach, that outcome risks becoming unlikely.
Crippling blow to the global war on terror
The American-led global war on terror, launched 20 years ago after the Sept 11, 2001, attacks against the United States, was already faltering before President Joe Biden took office. Now it may not recover from the blow delivered by Mr Biden's historic blunder in facilitating the Taliban's return to power in Afghanistan. The flag of the world's deadliest terrorists -- responsible for killing over 2,000 US soldiers since 2001 -- flies above Kabul on the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.
South China Sea grab
China has turned its contrived historical claims to the South China Sea into reality, despite a 2016 international tribunal's invalidating those claims.
America's China fantasy
Even if it is too late to force China to respect international rules and human rights, it is never too soon to end China's damaging free ride.
Belt and Road buckles
Mr Xi has chosen to pursue an unabashedly aggressive strategy that has many asking whether China is emerging as a new kind of imperialist power.