The AfPak riddle

The news about a new round of official peace talks between Taliban, the Afghan national government and US envoys are opening the door for some serious considerations about the future in one of the most troubled areas of the world. The Trump administration wants to get out of the country, without the American presence all the allies will withdraw as well, leaving the Afghan government on its own. By all means, Afghan armed forces aren’t ready to stand against the Taliban, nor they could be able to take back control from the warlords in the north.

A few days ago I was thinking about the worst case situation; a full reverse to 2001, with Taliban in control of most part of the country, with ISIS ready to set up shop in Kabul and Pakistan in the role of the unofficial nuclear-powered protector. By all means, it will be a nightmare.  Then I made up my mind, realizing that a significant number of changes had occurred in the last 18 years.

The New Silk Road

There are projects, big projects, and empire-level projects. We have a global empire in the making, and this is one of most significant warning signs ever in human history. Ever heard of the Silk Road? Well, the remake will eclipse the original version this time.

Italian warbirds in China

English: Claire Chennault in his office at Kunming, China, about May 1942 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Everybody knows about the Flying Tigers, the American air fighters group in China in WWII. Aside from the movies and all the narrative stuff, that was about a group of American personnel that acted in China, fighting side by side with Chinese against the forces of the Japanese Empire. They learned a lot from the experience made in Spain, where they fought against Italian and German pilots in the civil war that precedeed WWII.

But the Chinese were actively looking for warplanes in the ’30s, knowing for sure that war against Japan will come. So they looked for any option available, including purchasing Italian warplanes. So there was a time when the Kingdom of Italy supplied with machines and personnel and only the political decision to favor the Japanese side. In my country, referring to that years, there was somewhat a technological clash between those who favored a more traditional kind of airplane, biplanes, and those who were looking forward to the monoplane models inspired by American manifacturers.

Nationalization Is The Future?

When it comes to discuss about the global economy crisis the question about finance always comes up: how can a nation put a stop to the economic power of a multinational financial entity?

This is a peculiar type of asymmetrical warfare; a state, no matter how big it is, can’t compete against a multinational subject of the financial battlefield. If a nation tries to enforce a harder regulation system on its markets finance cartels simply withdraw their money from that markets and the nation’s economy sink like a paper-made Titanic. If the market regulation are too lose, just like today, the finance operators simply do what they want and the nations’s economy is always at stake.

The Art of War

When it comes to politics or warfare the name of chinese general Sun-Tzu always rise up, a sort of global cultural reference for developing a winning  strategy. As it happen Sun-Tzu’s masterpiece, “The Art of War”, is a worldwide success, translated in more and more languages every year.

A pity that so few really read the book and fewer more understand it.

Be careful with Syria

All right, we’re on the eve of a bombing campaign against Syria. Everybody knows it and all of us already got the commemorative T-shirt (My brother bombed Syria and all I’ve got it’s this lousy T-shirt?). What we have to remember is that they’re waiting for an opportunity to strike back.

Just another dirty little war

Good morning Ladies and Gentlemen, are you ready for another dirty little war? A new conflict will start before the end of this week so be sure to have enough popcorn and soda for the non-stop flow of TV shows about that. Now, it’s time to get some information.

What if a missile falls?

OK, let’s play a war scenario. A little one, just for the “fun” of it. Let’s say that the DPRK is so crazy to actually fire a couple of medium-range missiles. One straight to Japan, one down south to their separate brothers. In this game we can assume that both missiles will hit without malfunctions, both with conventional warheads.

The game in North Korea

Some week ago I’ve dedicated a post about North Korea (here), the basic idea was that we have to consider this country as a problem to solve and not about a memory of the Cold War era. Nowadays DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, no pun intended) is everywhere in the news with no less than the menace of an all-out nuclear war against USA. Media have gone crazy about it and the Net follows the same path, with a number of people projecting this war scenario ’till a full-scale conflict with China, Russia and Japan involved. OK, it’s time to think. And to cool down. Look at those faces, they are the solution at this problem.

UN weapons treaty – a look to the reality

Yesterday we got the headline about the upcoming UN weapons treaty, the first time in history we reach an international agreement about this kind of commerce worldwide. The idea is a good one and its long path inside the UN organization and the years of diplomatic efforts behind the scenes are quite as good. But… you already know that there will at least a “but”, isn’t it?