Complex research (by Marco Emanuele):
L’orologio della storia va avanti / The clock of history marches on | The Global Eye
Pensiero complesso, nel dubbio / Complex thinking, in doubt | The Global Eye
Laboratori di pensiero complesso / Complex thinking laboratories | The Global Eye
La (vera) politica è umano-planetaria / (True) politics is human-planetary | The Global Eye
I futuri che ci aspettano / The futures that await us | The Global Eye
Tempi duri per il pensiero / Hard times for thinking | The Global Eye
Distinzioni fondamentali / Fundamental distinctions | The Global Eye
L’assoluto della sicurezza lineare / Absolute linear security | The Global Eye
Disumanità / Inhumanity | The Global Eye
From global think tanks
The analyses published here do not necessarily reflect the strategic thinking of The Global Eye.
Today’s about: Armenia-Azerbaijan-US-Europe; Gaza-Israel; Lebanon; Syria; US-Russia
Armenia – Azerbaijan – US – Europe
(Jim O’Brien – European Council on Foreign Relations) On August 8th, American president Donald Trump hosted the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan to announce a framework that could potentially end the two countries’ decades-long conflict. While many parts of the deal had been in place for almost a year, the White House ceremony creates the need for swift action for the deal to stick. Europeans can influence the process, with their leverage growing as attention turns to the region’s possible integration into global markets. – Peace in the Caucasus: Ensuring Europe plays a role after Trump’s ceremony | ECFR
Gaza – Israel
(The Soufan Center) An expanded Israeli offensive against Hamas in Gaza, approved by Israel’s cabinet on Thursday, is unlikely to produce the rescue of remaining Israeli hostages or force Hamas to disarm. Israel has reduced the scope of its plan to focus on Gaza City in an effort to blunt the escalating global criticism of Israel’s war effort and the dire humanitarian conditions in the enclave. U.S., Egyptian, and Qatari mediators are reworking proposals that would end the conflict, but the political and strategic requirements of both Israeli and Hamas leaders complicate the search for a resolution. U.S. and regional officials are pressing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to detail a “day after” plan that welcomes the return of the West Bank-based, PLO-dominated Palestinian Authority (PA) to Gaza and relies on Arab forces to secure the territory. – Israeli Offensive Proceeds as Mediators Scramble to End the Gaza Conflict – The Soufan Center
(UN News) As hunger and malnutrition deepen in the Gaza Strip, humanitarian missions continue to face delays and impediments, while scorching temperatures are adding to the suffering of the population. – Hunger and a heatwave plague the Gaza Strip | UN News
Lebanon
(UN News) UN peacekeepers in southern Lebanon have uncovered rocket launchers, mortar rounds and other unauthorized weapons, while the country grapples with a severe drought, threatening millions with life-threatening water shortages – Peacekeepers find weapons trove in southern Lebanon, as drought threatens millions | UN News
Syria
(UN News) Top UN human rights investigators said on Thursday that war crimes may have been committed in predominantly Alawite areas of Syria in a wave of deadly violence earlier this year. – Syria: Violence in Alawite areas may be war crimes, say rights investigators | UN News
US – Russia
(Jana Kobzova – European Council on Foreign Relations) As of August 15th, Vladimir Putin’s period of international isolation will be effectively over. Despite not delivering on any of President Donald Trump’s demands to stop Russia’s war against Ukraine, he is having a get-together with his American counterpart. The two will debate Ukraine and European security with neither Ukrainians nor the Europeans in the room—and in Alaska, around 5000 miles away from Europe itself. This is another good outcome for the Kremlin. It fits into Putin’s vision of the world in which great powers decide the fate of the smaller ones—the exact opposite of Europe’s vision. – Trump meets Putin: Why the Alaska summit is no Yalta—yet | ECFR
(Paul Globe – The Jamestown Foundation) Moscow believes the upcoming Alaska summit will end Russian President Vladimir Putin’s international isolation, taking note of its location in Alaska, which Russia once owned. Russian commentators are interpreting the summit as U.S. acceptance of Moscow’s view that decisions can be made about Ukraine without Ukraine. Pro-Kremlin media claim that any outcome of the summit will be advantageous for Moscow: if U.S. President Donald Trump refuses to accept Putin’s terms, Trump will not get the deal he hopes for, but if he does, the gulf between Washington and Europe will deepen. – Moscow’s Mouthpieces Claim Russia Has Already Won Ahead of Alaska Summit – Jamestown
(Charles A. Kupchan, Liana Fix, and Paul B. Stares – Council on Foreign Relations) The August 15 summit at a U.S. air base in Alaska between Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Donald Trump culminates months of diplomatic efforts by the White House to end Europe’s bloodiest conflict since World War II. Trump entered office vowing to end the three-year war swiftly, and he initially focused much of the blame for his peacemaking challenges on Ukraine and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. However, in recent months Trump has directed more criticism at Putin for relentless and increasingly destructive Russian attacks on Ukraine, setting an early August deadline for Russia to show genuine commitment to a ceasefire or face harsher sanctions. As the deadline approached, Russian and U.S. officials agreed to a bilateral summit to try to reach common ground. Their decision to exclude Zelenskyy from the meeting raised alarm in both Kyiv and European capitals about what sort of deal—and Ukrainian territorial concessions—Putin and Trump could agree to. – What to Expect From the Trump-Putin Alaska Summit | Council on Foreign Relations
(Stephen Sestanovich – Council on Foreign Relations) President Donald Trump must be tired of all the stern exhortations, especially from European officials and commentators, not to let his summit with Russian leader Vladimir Putin become “another Munich.” (Ditto for “another Yalta.”) Everything about this advice is at odds with the way Trump most likely sees the meeting. It tells him not to be too friendly to Putin, when we know he thinks good personal relations are the key to solving problems. Worse, it implies the president could end up selling out Ukraine, just as British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain let Adolf Hitler start annexing his neighbors after they met in Munich. Worst of all, these warnings may sound to Trump like a clamor for war. That, we should remember, is what Chamberlain would have gotten by standing tall against Hitler in 1938. So, let’s try another summit analogy, one that compares Trump to strong leaders, not weak ones, that allows him to have a cordial sit-down with a visiting tyrant and open up vistas of peace and reconciliation—but only on terms favorable to the United States. A tall order, you might think, but there’s a meeting between Russian and U.S. leaders that passes all these tests: Ronald Reagan’s two days of talks with Mikhail Gorbachev at Reykjavik in October 1986. Not only was the Reykjavik summit a landmark in East-West relations, there’s even some reason to think it influenced Trump’s thinking. Having published his book, The Art of the Deal, less than a year earlier, Trump had become a kind of celebrity expert on bargaining and began to take a greater interest in international negotiations. – Echoes of Reykjavik: What Trump Can Learn From a Failed Summit | Council on Foreign Relations
(Frederick Kempe – Atlantic Council) The most important square foot in geopolitics is the space between Donald Trump’s ears. That’s the way a Trump administration insider put it to me a few days ago, betraying pride by association, just as the White House announced the US president’s decision to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin. A second Trump administration official told me he believes that what gives Trump such outsized geopolitical influence, some seven months into his administration, starts with his “heterodox” approach to foreign policy. That’s a fancy way of describing his out-of-the-box thinking on issues that have long defied conventional diplomacy. Trump is so confident in his own negotiating skills and in his country’s negotiating leverage that “he doesn’t mind who is on the other side of the table,” whether US friend or foe, the official explained. – When he meets Putin in Alaska, ‘heterodox’ Trump will face his biggest geopolitical test yet – Atlantic Council
