The West Should Develop the Trans-Caspian Trade Corridor
![Freight train at the China-Kazakhstan Logistics Cooperation base in Lianyungang, China. Photo credit: CFOTO/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect.](https://static.jstribune.com/jst-site/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/02171703/trainn-1024x554.jpg)
Development of the Trans-Caspian corridor would shift trade and energy routes between Europe and Asia to favor Western commercial and strategic interests. Over the past decade, global trade infrastructure has been transformed by China’s economic rise and its strategic investments in trade routes. Central Asia, the “belt buckle” on China’s Belt and Road Initiative, is […]
Time to Repeal Jackson-Vanik in Central Asia
![Adrian Smith, Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. Photo credit: Rod Lamkey - CNP/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect.](https://static.jstribune.com/jst-site/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/27155330/smith_n-1024x554.jpg)
Jackson-Vanik was a cornerstone of the US response to the Soviet Union during the Cold War. But it is time for Congress to remove this outdated policy in order to strengthen relationships with Central Asia and present a US commercial alternative to Russia and China. The Jackson-Vanik Amendment to the Trade Act of 1974 denied US […]
Ghosts at the Banquet: The Washington NATO Summit
![Photo credit: Artem Priakhin / SOPA Images via Reuters Connect.](https://static.jstribune.com/jst-site/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/15103357/biden_n-1024x554.jpg)
The Vilnius NATO summit of 2023 was stalked by a spectre. How would the allies deal with Ukraine’s NATO aspirations while its vaunted counter-offensive had gotten off to a sputtering start, amidst nuclear saber rattling by Vladimir Putin and his henchmen, eliciting in turn a focus on “escalation management” by Joe Biden’s national security team. […]
An ‘America First’ Democracy Support Agenda for the Next President
![Photo credit: Shutterstock.](https://static.jstribune.com/jst-site/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/01044938/US_n-1024x554.jpg)
Freedom and democracy have declined globally over the last two decades. This is bad for US security and prosperity, because autocracies hostile to the United States find more willing supporters among other autocrats. Furthermore, American companies trying to access markets of less-democratic developing nations face opaque regulatory regimes subject to the whims of unaccountable predatory […]
A Freedom Strategy for the Global South
![Photo credit: Shutterstock.](https://static.jstribune.com/jst-site/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/19130925/china_n-1024x554.jpeg)
In the current cold war, the US and its allies in the Free World bloc are in a sharp contest with the authoritarian, revisionist, and expansionist bloc of China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea. The stakes could not be higher. If the Free World loses this contest, the freedom, security, and prosperity of Americans and its […]
How to Defeat the New Axis of Evil
![Photo credit: Shutterstock.](https://static.jstribune.com/jst-site/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/14164421/china_n-1024x554.jpeg)
Two blocs emerged after the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the Iran-backed terror in the Middle East: The Free World and the New Axis of Evil. By supporting each other, the countries of the New Axis of Evil are more dangerous together than they are separately. The Free World countries must design new policies to […]
No End to National Security Surprises
![Photo credit: REUTERS/Larry Downing.](https://static.jstribune.com/jst-site/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/09135933/cia_n-1024x554.jpeg)
The surprise was total and horrific—Israeli men, women and children brutally killed or taken hostage by Hamas on October 7, 2023. Israel’s vaunted intelligence services failed to provide adequate warning, its military—the Israeli Defense Forces—failed to provide adequate security, and Israeli political leadership remained cocooned in their comfortable assumptions about risks to Israeli security posed by Palestinians in […]
What Might Deter Xi Jinping?
![Photo credit: REUTERS/Tingshu Wang/File Photo.](https://static.jstribune.com/jst-site/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/07172737/xi_n-1024x554.jpg)
The past two years have witnessed several failures of deterrence – Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and Hamas’ attack on Israel in October 2023. The invasion of Ukraine heightened global awareness that military force by a state actor is not a relic of the past and could occur in other flashpoints around the […]
Southeast Asia’s Growing Importance to Global Trade
![ASEAN and Australian leaders at a summit in Melbourne, Australia, March 4, 2024. Photo credit: George Chan / SOPA Images via Reuters Connect.](https://static.jstribune.com/jst-site/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/10175117/asean_n-1-1024x554.jpg)
The world is in the initial stages of an evolution in the structure of global trade. While popular narratives about the era of globalization described a wide dispersion of trade flows and supply chains to all corners of the world, the reality was different. Global trade remained very concentrated. For example, close to 40 percent […]
The Gaza War and East Asia
![Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, President of the United Arab Emirates and Fumio Kishida, Prime Minister of Japan, during an official reception in Abu Dhabi, July 17, 2023. Photo credit: Ryan Carter/UAE Presidential Court via REUTERS.](https://static.jstribune.com/jst-site/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/15010011/japan_n-1-1024x554.jpg)
What can be said about the impact of current developments in the Middle East on East Asia? The most compelling current development is obviously the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, which has dominated the headlines for two months and will do so for many more months to come. War arouses strong emotions. […]