Category: Security & Defense

Russia’s Black Sea defeats get flushed down Vladimir Putin’s memory hole

There was much pomp and pageantry on display recently in former Russian imperial capital Saint Petersburg as Vladimir Putin presided over the country’s annual Navy Day festivities. In truth, however, Putin and his assembled admirals had very little to celebrate. Over the past year, Russia’s once-vaunted Black Sea Fleet has been decimated by Ukrainian drones

Will the killings of Hamas and Hezbollah leaders lead to a wider war?

GET UP TO SPEED Two days, two earth-shaking strikes. This morning, an air strike killed Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, one day after a rocket strike killed Hezbollah commander Fouad Shukur in Beirut. Israel reportedly launched both strikes as it continues its response to Hamas’s terrorist attack on October 7, 2023, and an

‘I was a Blackwater mercenary in Iraq’

In Season 2, Episode 4 of the Guns for Hire podcast, host Alia Brahimi is joined by former Blackwater—rebranded as Academi— contractor Morgan Lerette in a wide-ranging conversation. They discuss everything from Blackwater’s lax vetting procedures, the opacity surrounding the laws and regulations governing Private Military Companies (PMCs), the absence of a support system for former

After 2011, the United States stayed on the sidelines—to Libya’s detriment

In the previous volume on foreign actors in Libya, I divided U.S. involvement into five stages, including the intervention itself, the immediate post-conflict period, and the aftermath of the tragic death of Ambassador Chris Stevens in Benghazi. As is well documented, Ambassador Stevens’ death created a long-lasting political firestorm starting in the 2012 election year

Internationalized kleptocracy is on the rise in Libya

On April 16, 2024, UN Special Representative for Libya Abdoulaye Bathily announced he would resign, citing a “lack of political will and good faith” among Libyan leaders. Few would disagree with his diagnosis that the vested interests of Libyan leaders have created a roadblock for progress. Bathily conducted eighteen months of shuttle diplomacy before concluding