United Kingdom

French Defense Minister Le Drian trying to relaunch European defense initiative

By Pierre Tran, Defense News

From Pierre Tran, Defense News:  French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian was due to meet European Union and NATO senior officials in a first visit to Brussels as part of France’s drive to relaunch a European defense initiative

Iran’s supreme leader says Nonaligned Movement, not NATO, should help resolve Syria crisis

By the AP

Germany and China: The New Special Relationship

By Stephan Richter, the Globalist

From Stephan Richter, the Globalist:  Now that the German Chancellor is once again visiting China, accompanied by scores of her top ministers and an outsized contingent of CEOs, the world is beginning to take note.

The Main Event

By Julian Lindley-French

Many people have inspired me. Winston Churchill for refusing to compromise with evil, Ed Murrow for taking on corrupt power to protect free speech, Martin Luther King for reminding Americans that all people are born equal and Nelson Mandela for creating a nation out of forgiveness. But there is one who this week will be […]

Canada uncertain about joining NATO’s Arctic war games

By the Canadian Press

From the Canadian Press:  The administrative wing of Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s office worried about the optics of hundreds of Canadian troops taking part in a major NATO-sponsored Arctic war game in northern Norway earlier this year.

UK Support for Military Action in Syria not in America’s Best Interest

By Sarwar Kashmeri

The last time a British prime minister endorsed an American president’s plans for military intervention, it resulted in the US invasion of Iraq – one of the worst foreign policy blunders in recent American history. That is why last week’s endorsement by David Cameron of a warning by Barack Obama that even the threat of […]

The Syria Bluff

By Julian Lindley-French

It is clearly intelligence-led. President Obama and Prime Minister Cameron have said that any recourse to chemical weapons by Damascus would be “completely unacceptable” and would lead the US and UK to “revisit their approach” to the crisis. According to Obama even moving the weapons would cross an American “red line” with “enormous consequences”. The […]

Should Canada participate in NATO missions not supported by US assets?

By Elinor Sloan, Canadian Defense & Foreign Affairs Institute

From Elinor Sloan, Canadian Defense & Foreign Affairs Institute: The clincher is the content of the generalized reference to “NATO” when we talk about a “NATO operation.”

Why independent Scotland must stay in NATO

By George Kerevan, the Scotsman

From George Kerevan, the Scotsman:  [A]t its Chicago summit in May, under heavy German pressure, Nato altered its so-called “deterrence and defence posture”.

America Needs a Rudyard Kipling

By Sarwar Kashmeri

 Not long ago Britain was the world’s hegemon. Nothing stood in the way of British might. Or as the famous saying had it, the sun never set on the British Empire. As it was then with Britain, so it is now with the United States. Somewhere in the world the sun is always rising on […]