BY DR CHRIS TUCK Stabilisation is out of fashion: burned by our experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan there seems precious little appetite for engagement any time soon in complex nation-building tasks. Instead, the new ‘concept du jour is ‘Building Stability Overseas,’ a term that encompasses stabilisation, but also a whole range of other more discrete… Read More Syria: Bombing, Peace, and Then What?
By DR STUART GRIFFIN For those of us who are getting slightly older than we care to admit, it does not seem so long ago that the UK was championing new UN peacekeeping for a new era and pledging its full support to UN efforts to halt the slide of failing states into collapse. For… Read More The UK and UN Peacekeeping: Back in Blue?
This is the third in a series of posts to come out of the Regional Security Research Centre (RSRC) organised Round Table titled ‘Decoding IS [DAISH] – Retrospect and Prospect’, which took place on 8 February 2016. The Round Table covered issues concerned with the evolution, regional linkages, strategy and tactics, as well as the future… Read More Iraq: Shi’a Militias – Partners or Contestants of Iraqi Stability
DR DAVID MORGAN-OWEN The Defence Studies Department’s article writing month initiative is now in its third week. Judging by our shared googledocs page, my colleagues appear to be making impressive progress towards their writing goals. Personally, I am working to finish a book manuscript; a process which involves as much deleting as it does new… Read More Article Writing Month: On Community and Progress
DR ELLEN HALLAMS During the first week of February I was asked to deliver a talk at the annual Norwegian Air Power Conference at the Royal Norwegian Air Force Academy in Trondheim. The theme this year was ‘NATO: Threats and Challenges’ and I was asked to reflect on whether NATO today has common threats and… Read More Walking a Tightrope: NATO, Russia, Islamic State and the new brinkmanship
DR KATE UTTING In the past information, influence or non-kinetic psychological aspects of conflict had a supporting function to the physical, kinetic aspects; today it is seen as central. Militaries have done ‘influence’ for years, but there is a dominant view that in the current information environment all actions, deeds and words are scrutinised in… Read More Palestine 1945-48: the Information Campaign and the Limits of Influence
DR MIKE FINCH Two weeks of the Defence Studies Department Article Writing Month have now passed and progress has been good. If a word count stands as the ultimate guide, then I should be content. At the close of week one I was pushing two thousand words. By the end of last week the figure… Read More Article Writing Month Update: Confessions Of An Instinctive Writer
This is the first in a series of posts to come out of the Regional Security Research Centre (RSRC) organised Round Table titled ‘Decoding IS [DAISH] – Retrospect and Prospect’, which took place on 8 February 2016. The Round Table covered issues concerned with the evolution, regional linkages, strategy and tactics, as well as the… Read More IRAN AND DAISH: A CAUSE TO AGREE ON?
PROF GREG KENNEDY Prof. Kennedy’s latest publication ‘Britain’s War at Sea, 1914-1918: The War they Thought, the War the Fought’ is now available from Ashgate Publishing. The concept of “lessons-learned” has become a growth industry in the realm of academic, and not so academic, writing on Western strategic and operational processes within defence and security… Read More BRITAIN’S WAR AT SEA, 1914-1918: THE WAR THEY THOUGHT AND THE WAR THEY GOT
By DR AMIR M KAMEL January 16, 2016 marked a significant day for the Iranian regime. On this day, aka ‘Implementation Day’, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), informally known as the United Nation’s (UN) nuclear watchdog, announced that Tehran had ‘completed the necessary preparatory steps to start the implementation of the Joint Comprehensive Plan… Read More Winners and Losers of a post-sanctions Iran
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