As the problematic year 2023 storms towards its conclusion, carrying with it a flood of alarmist analyses in the international discourse with regards to the global and regional security situation, it would seem imperative to seek to specify the securit…
Författararkiv: Michael Sahlin
Winds of war over Gaza – and beyond
As conditions in the US Congress, with House GOP:s frantically struggling to unite over whom to chair its House caucus, continue to display dysfunctionality, president Biden has been put to the ultimate test as world leader in times of international di…
Mourning becomes Syria’s army of refugees
Recent trends in Syria and Turkey again direct focus on the incredible tragedy of Syria in general and the millions of Syrian refugees and IDP:s in particular, the victims of the for-ever conflicts within and around war-ridden Syria, for all the indiff…
Turkey at the crossroads – Five more of the same, or Zeitenwende à la Turca
At the time of writing Turkey’s (or nowadays Turkiye’s) immensely important elections, parliamentary and presidential, two simultaneous but complementary dramas, are but a few weeks ahead. At stake is much more than a mere change or not of government; …
Iraq 20 years after the gravely mistaken US invasion: Reflections on lessons learned
Iraq, squeezed between Iran and the Arab/Sunni world, and internally between its Shia majority and its Sunni (and Kurdish) minority, is a demographic miracle. The demographic miracle – hardships before, grim prospects ahead By 1990 – after the long yea…
Israel in deep trouble: whence and where to?
It has of late become inevitable to warn that things in and about Israel – domestically as well as internationally – have turned even more ugly than what pessimistic analysts of the Israeli political scene after Benjamin Netanyahu’s ominous electoral v…
Africa’s giant facing elections – Nigeria’s uncertain way ahead
We shall soon see if Nigeria, this enormous and fast growing giant of Africa, will provide a living example to show that Western liberal democracy can be made to work, with an orderly and peaceful transfer of power, even in a context of a mega-size cou…
Earthquake in Turkey and Syria: Reflexions on emerging consequences
The earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria on February 6, 2023, was a natural disaster of “biblical” proportions with devastating humanitarian consequences, a total death toll in excess of 30 000 people estimated at the time of writing, but with a tra…
The EU, Western Balkans in the shadow of Ukraine: Time for re-appraisal? – A heavy burden for the upcoming Swedish EU Presidency
Again, crisis between Serbia and Kosovo Once again, winds of crisis and perhaps war blow over the Serbia-Kosovo border, all these years since the end-of millennium armed confrontation between the Milosevic regime in Belgrade and the Western-supported i…
The EU, Western Balkans in the shadow of Ukraine: Time for re-appraisal? – A heavy burden for the upcoming Swedish EU Presidency
Again, crisis between Serbia and Kosovo Once again, winds of crisis and perhaps war blow over the Serbia-Kosovo border, all these years since the end-of millennium armed confrontation between the Milosevic regime in Belgrade and the Western-supported i…
Winds of War (again) gaining momentum in the Eastern Mediterranean
Do you remember the Kardak/Imea crisis in the Aegean Sea back in 1996? The spiraling events of action-reaction then brought political mishandling of old Greek-Turkish issues, with roots from the time of the 1923 Lausanne Treaty, to the brink of open wa…
Sweden/Finland/Turqiye/NATO – On The Noble Art of Strategic Ambiguity
It was – apparently – a close call. But on the very day of the opening of the important NATO summit in Madrid there was to the relief of many a last-minute agreement between one member country, Turkey, and two Nordic membership applicants, Sweden and F…
Taking Turkey’s legitimate security concerns seriously
We hear a lot these days about the need to take Turkey’s (or Turkiye´s as the official name now reads, with proper dots over the u) legitimate security concerns seriously – to the extent that they are indeed legitimate. It was repeated by Jens Stoltenb…
Prospects for troubled Libya – fission or fusion? or partition? [1]
European and transatlantic security would suffer a big loss if in spite of all international efforts Libya were to descend into armed chaos and instability 11 troubled years after the fall of Ghadafi in 2011 and then prevailing Arab spring conditions. …
Iran JCPOA deal: To be, or not to be? And for how long? [1]
And then there is Iran and the JCPOA nuclear issue, the key to Middle East stability. “Time is running out” for a solution and an agreement, said State Secretary Blinken already in January this year before the eighth round of proxy talks in Vienna. And…
Saved by Putin’s Ukraine aggression? Erdogan’s balancing act on tightening rope [1]
The Ukraine crisis threatens an already hard-pressed Erdogan regime with a host of added economic and political burdens, with presidential and parliamentary elections looming. At the same time it is becoming increasingly clear that, nonetheless, the Ru…
Ukraine Crisis, the Brussels Summits, Regime Change and Red Lines [1]
President Biden wrapped up his extraordinary European tour, including NATO, EU and G7 summits plus a tour of refugee inundated Poland, with a powerful Warsaw speech – aimed at being on historical par with those of Kennedy and Reagan in Berlin – where h…
Avskräckningens dilemma: reflexioner om trovärdiga röda linjer m a a Ukraina-krigets risker
I det läge som skapats av Rysslands aggression fr o m den 24 januari talas i den strida floden av svenska och internationella inlagor mycket om både det andra och det tredje världskriget, chockerande mycket, kunde man tycka. Det handlar ju då dels om a…
The Trump card – ett säkerhetspolitiskt mardrömsscenario (ett av flera)
När detta skrivs i början av november 2021 pågår COP26 i Glasgow om den domedagspräglade klimatfrågan och det multilaterala samarbete som enligt nästan alla tydligt och klart krävs för att världen ska ha en chans att uppnå Paris-överenskommelsens mål o…
“America is back” – to Square one?
Reflexioner om USA, Nato, Afghanistan och det rättfärdiga kriget ”It’s over” var rubriken med världskrigsstora bokstäver i den amerikanska försvarsmaktens husorgan ”Stars and Stripes” med anledning av president Bidens besked tidigare i augusti om att U…