Views Digest

December, 2017

  • 3 December

    Spain’s Kosovo-Catalonia Conundrum

    Madrid is inadvertently equating Catalonia and Kosovo and, by doing so, revealing itself to be unable to distinguish between legitimate aspirations for self-rule and destabilizing separatism.

  • 2 December

    Bangladesh Can Get Something Out of This Mess

    Both China and India should wake up and take Bangladesh a little more seriously, says one analyst.

  • 2 December

    Why Silicon Valley Wants You to Text And Drive

    Why do tech companies care so much about self-driving cars? If drivers no longer need to pay attention to the road, they can use their mobile devices even more.

November, 2017

  • 20 November

    Jet Fuel From Sugarcane? It’s Not A Flight of Fancy

    Scientists have engineered sugarcane to increase its oil content and are developing renewable jet aircraft fuel from the oil. The engineered sugarcane could become a valuable energy crop.

  • 17 November

    Why Russia is Back in Afghanistan

    Three decades after a humiliating military defeat in Afghanistan, Russia has returned to the scene. This adds Afghanistan to a long list of hotspots – from Syria and Libya to Venezuela and Ukraine – where Moscow’s low-cost, high-impact foreign policy is challenging the West. In Afghanistan, the Kremlin is covertly supporting the Taliban and other groups, and hosting regional talks with Pakistan, Iran and China. And whereas Moscow …

  • 6 November

    Economics Key to US Relevance in Southeast Asia

    As China grows increasingly able to weaponize its financial clout for security purposes, failure on the part of the US to craft a comprehensive economic response undermines the autonomy of Southeast Asian countries and diminishes US influence.

  • 5 November

    Does Iran’s Chabahar Matter?

    To utilize CPEC projects to the advantage of Pakistan in a geo-politically loaded environment, Pakistani leaders will need to pull up their socks.

  • 5 November

    What to Look Forward After Loss of 33,000 Jobs

    Even though Republicans and Democrats agree that the effect of the hurricanes dampened the September report, minimal shifts from the report in August seem to indicate Trump hasn’t managed to stimulate job growth the way he promised to.

October, 2017

  • 30 October

    The Balochistan Disconnect

    While all the portents of returning to peace are clearly present, massive political and economic initiatives, which includes construction of dozens of small dams to create agriculture opportunities, are still required to correct the prevailing “Balochistan disconnect”.

  • 24 October

    Bangladesh: What Strategic Defense Looks Like

    Bangladesh should be more interested in allying with the West for political, economic, and military assistance rather than narrow visions of the line of credit which benefits the creditor over the debtor.