From global think tanks
The analyses published here do not necessarily reflect the strategic thinking of The Global Eye.
Today’s about: Bangladesh; China; Critical Minerals; Madagascar; Munich Security Conference; Sudan; Syria; US; US-Canada; US-Cuba
Bangladesh
(The Soufan Center) General election in Bangladesh represented one of the most consequential political inflection points in the country’s post-independence history and is widely seen as a litmus test for democratic revival, political stability, and the nation’s future trajectory. With the Awami League absent from the ballot, the election pivoted to a contest primarily between the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and an 11-party alliance including the once-banned Islamist Jamaat-e-Islami party and smaller parties such as the youth-founded National Citizen Party (NCP), with BNP securing a majority. Alongside the parliamentary vote, Bangladeshis also cast ballots in a referendum on proposed constitutional reforms, including term limits for the prime minister and the creation of a bicameral legislature — measures designed to reduce executive concentration of power. Regionally, Bangladesh’s election carries significant weight in its geopolitical recalibration, specifically regarding relations with India, China, and Pakistan. – Bangladesh’s Democratic Reset and Regional Realignment – The Soufan Center
China
(Joseph Rodgers and Joseph S. Bermudez Jr. – CSIS) On February 6, the United States Undersecretary for Arms Control and International Security Thomas DiNanno accused China of conducting nuclear weapons tests that achieved supercritical yields, including one test on June 22, 2020. While this is not the first time that the United States has expressed concern about China’s nuclear testing activities, DiNanno’s February 6 statements at the UN Conference on Disarmament contained significantly more detail than previous U.S. statements about Chinese nuclear testing. The U.S. statement arrives four months after President Donald Trump stated that the United States would “start testing our Nuclear Weapons on an equal basis” as China and Russia in a Truth Social post. This follows a multiyear trend of escalating rhetoric regarding testing activities. In 2019, the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency accused Russia of “probably” conducting low-yield nuclear tests in violation of their moratorium. The annual U.S. Department of State Arms Control Verification and Compliance report has consistently stated that Russia has not adhered to its nuclear testing moratorium. The compliance report has raised concerns about Russian noncompliance and Chinese activity at Lop Nur, China’s nuclear test site, since 2019. The United States claims that Russia and China are both conducting low-yield nuclear tests in deep underground tunnels. Specifically, DiNanno mentioned that China has used “decoupling” to reduce the detectability of its nuclear tests. A decoupling experiment detonates a nuclear weapon in a large underground cavern—typically a salt dome. The blast’s explosive force reverberates through the cavern, muffling and reducing its seismic signature. Both the United States and the Soviet Union conducted decoupling experiments prior to the nuclear testing moratorium. For example, the United States detonated the Sterling nuclear test to explore decoupling in the Tatum Salt Dome near Hattiesburg, Mississippi. Because Lop Nur is built into a salt lake, the environment is geologically suited for such activities. However, the technical ground truth of what happened at Lop Nur on June 22, 2020, is difficult to verify. – Satellite Imagery Analysis of China’s Alleged 2020 Nuclear Test at Lop Nur
(Hugh Grant-Chapman, Leon Li, Brian Hart, Bonny Lin, Truly Tinsley, Feifei Hung – CSIS) In the mountain metropolis of Chongqing, China, a dimly lit factory assembles a new car every 60 seconds. Its secret? Robots. The sprawling Chang’An Automobile Digital Intelligence Factory is home to over 2000 robots and autonomous vehicles operating in tandem with surgical precision. When it opened in 2024, the facility claimed the title of Asia’s largest “dark factory,” so called because it is so thoroughly automated that it can theoretically operate in the dark without any human labor. More impressive still is that through this automation technology, the factory can produce cars at 20 percent less cost than traditional methods. The Chang’An Auto factory is emblematic of a wave of robotics-fueled automation that is transforming China’s industrial landscape. This and other recent achievements are the latest strides in a decade-long push to boost robotics adoption throughout China’s economy, particularly its manufacturing sector. Advanced automation has helped Chinese manufacturers cut costs, climb global value chains, and outcompete foreign competitors. Now, China’s robotics leaders are pioneering new robotics innovations and eyeing new markets. If this trajectory continues, manufacturing rivals around the world will face tough decisions as they scramble to remain competitive. This ChinaPower feature examines the growing role of robots in China’s economy and their impacts on China’s geopolitical position, particularly through the lens of manufacturing supply chains. It investigates three related trends in the Chinese robotics industry: surging demand for robots in China, growing supply of domestically manufactured robots, and recent efforts to innovate at the technological frontier. – Is China Leading the Robotics Revolution? | ChinaPower Project
(Mia Beams, Angus Soderberg – Council on Foreign Relations) The China and Climate primer series tracks and breaks down China’s engagement with climate and energy issues around the world. January coverage focused on a series of bilateral climate agreements, Chinese oil majors’ response to the U.S. capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, and China’s participation in the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting. – China and Climate: January 2026 | Council on Foreign Relations
Critical Minerals
(Gracelin Baskaran and Meredith Schwartz – CSIS) On February 4, during the inaugural Critical Minerals Ministerial at the Department of State, 55 foreign delegations from allied and partner nations convened to deepen cooperation on critical minerals security. The week featured several major announcements, including Project Vault—a domestic stockpile backed by the largest loan in the history of the Export-Import Bank of the United States—the launch of the new multilateral Forum on Resource Geostrategic Engagement (FORGE), and the signing of 13 new bilateral critical minerals frameworks and memoranda of understanding. Discussions also focused on price floors and the potential creation of a preferential trading bloc. Together, these developments suggest the Trump administration is complementing its bilateral engagements with a more plurilateral strategy, recognizing that meaningful market influence requires collective scale among major consuming and producing countries. – Critical Minerals Ministerial Introduces New International Cooperation Strategy
Madagascar
(UN News) Some 10 days after Tropical Cyclone Fytia brought heavy rains and flooding to Madagascar, Cyclone Gezani has left the island’s main port in ruins, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) said on Friday. Speaking to reporters from Madagascar’s capital Antananarivo, WFP Country Director Tania Goossens said some 400,000 people are facing acute humanitarian needs after the island was hit by back-to-back cyclones in the space of three weeks. Ms. Goossens recently returned from a mission to the port city Toamasina (also known as Tamatave), the country’s second largest urban centre, where Gezani made landfall on Tuesday evening with wind gusts of up to 250 kilometres per hour. “The scale of the destruction is really overwhelming,” Ms. Goossens insisted. – Madagascar: ‘Overwhelming’ destruction, surging needs after back-to-back cyclones – WFP | UN News
Munich Security Conference
(Michael Froman – Council on Foreign Relations) Greetings from the Hotel Bayerischer Hof, where the 62nd Munich Security Conference—also known as “Davos with guns”—is well underway. I just published a guest essay in the New York Times that reflects on why this year’s conference has arrived at a pivotal moment. Last year, there was uncertainty about the United States’ longtime role as Europe’s security guarantor, and Ukraine was the dominant topic of discussion. U.S. Vice President JD Vance, too, shocked attendees when he said that Europe faced a “threat from within.” – A Fork in the Road at the Munich Security Conference | Council on Foreign Relations
Sudan
(UN News) Paramilitary forces in Sudan unleashed “a wave of intense violence…shocking in its scale and brutality” during their final offensive to capture the besieged city of El Fasher last October, committing atrocities that amount to war crimes and possible crimes against humanity, according to a report released on Friday by the UN human rights office, OHCHR. “Persistent impunity fuels continued cycles of violence,” said UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk, calling for credible investigations and accountability for perpetrators. Sudan’s national army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) militia have been fighting each other for control of the country for almost three years. The new report details widespread atrocities committed during the RSF assault on the besieged city of El Fasher in North Darfur. The RSF and allied Arab militia carried out mass killings and summary executions, sexual violence, abductions for ransom, torture and ill-treatment, detention, disappearances, pillage and the use of children in hostilities. Many attacks were directed against civilians and persons hors de combat based on ethnicity or perceived affiliation. – ‘Like a scene out of a horror movie’: UN report warns of war crimes in Sudan’s El Fasher | UN News
Syria
(UN News) Syria’s fragile political transition has gained fresh momentum with a landmark agreement between Damascus and Kurdish authorities in the northeast, but renewed violence in the south, Israeli incursions and deep humanitarian needs underscore how precarious the path to stability remains, senior UN officials told the Security Council on Friday. Briefing ambassadors for the first time as Deputy Special Envoy, Claudio Cordone pointed to the 30 January ceasefire and integration agreement between the Syrian Government and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) as a potentially transformative development. The deal provides for a phased military and administrative integration of northeast Syria and includes provisions on the return of displaced people and the protection of Kurdish civil and educational rights, building on Presidential Decree 13 on linguistic, cultural and citizenship rights. “Hostilities have ended and work on an implementation plan has been progressing in a positive manner,” Mr. Cordone said, noting deployments of Ministry of Interior forces in Al-Hasakeh and Qamishli, and discussions on local governance and political appointments. The Secretary-General on 30 January welcomed the agreement, appealing for all sides “to work swiftly to ensure its implementation, especially in terms of the peaceful – integration of northeast Syria, the rights of Syrian Kurds, the safe, dignified and voluntary return of the displaced.”. In a presidential statement issued on Thursday, Council members likewise welcomed the “comprehensive agreement” and stressed the need to adhere to it to “minimize civilian suffering” and prevent any “security vacuum” around ISIL (Da’esh) detention facilities. – Syria transition gains ground with Kurdish deal, but violence and humanitarian strain persist | UN News
US
(James M. Lindsay – Council on Foreign Relations) Monday is Presidents’ Day. (…) American kids often say they want to be the president when they grow up. You have to wonder why. True, a few presidents have loved the job. Theodore Roosevelt said, “No president has ever enjoyed himself as much as I have enjoyed myself.”. Most presidents, though, have found the job demanding, perhaps too demanding. James K. Polk pretty much worked himself to exhaustion; he died at the age of fifty-three less than four months after completing his single term in office. Zachary Taylor, the hero of the Mexican American War, found being president harder than leading men into battle. Dwight D. Eisenhower suffered a heart attack and a stroke from the stress of leading the Free World. Plenty of presidents found life in the White House stifling. Harry S. Truman called it “the great white jail.” Bill Clinton described it as “the crown jewel of the federal penitentiary system.” Barack Obama likened it to living in “a bubble.”. Many presidents also expressed relief once they could be called “former president.” This trend started early. John Adams told his wife Abigail that George Washington looked too happy watching him take the oath of office. “Me–thought I heard him say, ‘Ay, I am fairly out and you fairly in! See which of us will be happiest!’”. Andrew Johnson, who was impeached by the House but acquitted by the Senate, returned to Capitol Hill as a senator from Tennessee six years after leaving the presidency. When an acquaintance mentioned that his new accommodations were smaller than his old ones at the White House, he replied: “But they are more comfortable.” Rutherford B. Hayes longed to escape what he called a “life of bondage, responsibility, and toil.”. The only part of the job that Chester A. Arthur liked was giving parties. He apparently did that quite well. His nickname was the “prince of hospitality.” Grover Cleveland claimed there was “no happier man in the United States” when he lost his reelection bid in 1888. Time away from the White House apparently changed his mind. He ran again in 1892 and won, making him the first, but no longer the only, president to serve two non-consecutive terms. By tradition, non-consecutive terms are counted as separate presidencies. That is why the United States has had forty-seven presidents, but just forty-five men have held the title. Being president certainly doesn’t spare one from great loss. John Tyler, Benjamin Harrison, and Woodrow Wilson all saw their wives die while they were in office. In Harrison’s case, his wife Caroline died of tuberculosis two weeks before he lost his bid for reelection to Grover Cleveland, the man he had defeated four years earlier. John Adams, Abraham Lincoln, Calvin Coolidge, and John F. Kennedy all lost children during their presidencies. Franklin Pierce’s son and last surviving child was killed in a train accident on the way to his father’s inauguration. Donald Trump, the only person besides Grover Cleveland to serve two non-consecutive terms in office, blames the media—or “Fake News” as he calls it—for making his job harder than it should be. But complaints about journalists are as old as the Republic. Thomas Jefferson suggested that newspaper editors divide their papers “into four chapters, heading the 1st, Truths. 2d, Probabilities. 3d, Possibilities. 4th, Lies.” Warren G. Harding presumably did not share this sentiment. He is the only president to have had a career in journalism. He owned and served as the publisher of the Marion Star in Marion, Ohio. He did not sell the paper until the third year of his presidency. – Celebrating Presidents’ Day | Council on Foreign Relations
US – Canada
(Diana Roy – Council on Foreign Relations) For more than a century, the United States and Canada have forged a strong partnership built on shared geography and economic and security cooperation. But while the two countries have traditionally had one of the closest bilateral ties in the world, relations have come under strain in recent years. – U.S.-Canada Relations | Council on Foreign Relations
US – Cuba
(Council on Foreign Relations) The United States and Cuba have had a strained relationship for nearly seven decades, dating back to Cuban leader Fidel Castro’s overthrow of a U.S.-backed government in 1959. Presidents Barack Obama and Raúl Castro took steps to normalize bilateral relations, including restoring diplomatic ties and expanding travel and trade. President Joe Biden eased some restrictions on Cuba following widespread protests and a government crackdown there, but ties have deteriorated again during Donald Trump’s second term. – U.S.-Cuba Relations Explained | Council on Foreign Relations
