Research & Commentary Results

What does a Biden presidency mean for the economy of Iran? The short answer is: not much. While the Iranian public considers his election good news for the country, these sentiments are fleeting and will soon fade. The reason is simple: Even if Joe Biden decides to reengage with Iran or reenter the 2015 nuclear deal on his first day in office, a Biden presidency will not change many crippling realities for the Iranian economy.

The War for Tripoli, launched by Gen. Khalifa Hifter in April 2019, came to an abrupt end in June 2020 after extensive Turkish military capabilities were introduced to the theater at the beginning of the year. This research paper seeks to drill down into the military, logistical, and technological aspects of the war, highlighting the unique role of drones, soft-kill and hard-kill air defense technologies, private military contractors, and extraterritorial military professionals in determining its final outcome. 

As the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh rages between Armenia and Azerbaijan, Russia and Turkey once again find themselves on opposite sides in a regional geopolitical war. With the reverberations from the fighting now spreading across the region, the fate of Idlib could be tied to battles elsewhere as Moscow potentially seeks to open up another front against Ankara.    

In areas under the control of both the Syrian regime and Autonomous Administration in North and East Syria (AANES) in Deir ez-Zor Province, the governing bodies are failing to secure the loyalty and support of locals. The security structures built by the regime and the AANES have coopted and incorporated local tribes to a significant extent, but a lack of support from the central governing bodies amid increasing ISIS attacks threatens long-term stability in the province. These two regional dynamics are outlined and compared in this paper to illustrate the dual challenges both governance bodies face in appealing to locals and thwarting the resurgence of ISIS in the area.

On October, 16, Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif set his country’s politics ablaze by offering a withering critique of the military establishment. Calling in from London via video conference, Sharif addressed a crowd of over 20,000 protestors at a rally in the Punjabi city of Gujranwalla organized by the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PMD), a recently formed coalition that brings together all major opposition parties. Under the PMD’s banner, erstwhile rivals like the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), and the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam–Fazlur (JUI-F) have joined forces to achieve two goals that they see as intertwined: unseating Prime Minister Imran Khan and regaining power from the military.

Iraq’s economic and fiscal crises, which came to the forefront this year following the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, were bound to happen at some point. What corona and the ensuing drop in oil prices and declining demand for oil did is accelerate the timing, according to the recently released Iraqi government white paper, a report of the Emergency Cell for Financial Reform. What the paper doesn’t predict is that in the next 6-12 months, and possibly beyond, we could see a worsening of the crisis with both current and future governments trying to adjust oil production and revenues in an effort to contain public discontent.

There are several curious aspects to the Pentagon’s new Guidance for Development of Alliances and Partnerships, or GDAP, which was publicly unveiled by U.S. Secretary of Defense Mark Esper on Oct. 20.

Let’s start with the context. Both as a candidate and later as president, Donald Trump has taken a transactional view of U.S. alliances and partnerships, alienating France, Germany, and other NATO allies in the process. Whether GDAP is an attempt to make amends remains to be seen.

Since May 2019, a series of Syrian loyalist offensives backed by the Russian air force has gradually encroached upon the country’s northwestern Idlib Province, home to the last major pocket of opposition-held territory. As the chief rebel group in control of Idlib, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) has employed dozens of suicide car bombs as part of its continued defense of the area. Formally known as suicide vehicle-born improvised explosive devices (SVBIEDs), these weapons have been a cornerstone of the group’s — and by extension, the entire opposition’s — military strategy since early stages of the war, when rebel forces began capturing and holding territory. In an attempt to further understand this strategy and how it has evolved over time, this case study seeks to compare and contrast HTS’s past and current use of SVBIEDs, with a heavy focus on the latter. It will also examine HTS’s evolving SVBIED design, paying particular attention to technical innovations such as environment-specific paint schemes, drone support teams, tablets with target coordinates, and live camera feeds, as well as upgraded main charges.

Ultimately, those set to suffer the most in this game of “poker” are Idlib’s enormous population of 3 million civilians.

As attacks by ISIS increase in both Iraq and Syria, the upcoming U.S. presidential election offers a turning point for how U.S. foreign policy will seek to address a potential ISIS resurgence. This paper lays out this growing problem and recommends policy, which will be constrained by the outcome of the November election.

Afghanistan remains at the center of U.S. and international counterterrorism concerns. As America prepares to pull out its military forces from the country, policymakers remain divided on how terrorist groups in Afghanistan might challenge the security of the U.S. and the threat they pose to allies and regional countries. Advocates of withdrawal argue that the terrorism threat from Afghanistan is overstated, while opponents say that it remains significant and is likely to grow after the drawdown of U.S. forces. This report evaluates the terrorism challenge in Afghanistan by focusing on the political trajectories of three key armed actors in the Afghan context: al-Qaeda, the Afghan Taliban, and the Islamic State.

Algeria is at a critical stage in its energy sector development. The nation has both the potential and the incentive to maximize its natural resources and become a renewable energy leader. In addition to its status as the second-most-populous country in North Africa, Algeria is noteworthy for its relative size, wealth, location, gas reserves, renewable energy potential, and greenhouse gas emissions. Recent oil and gas price volatility and increasing domestic electricity demand provide impetus for Algeria to prioritize clean energy investment.

On June 17, 2020, the U.S. State Department’s special envoy to Syria, Joel Rayburn, announced the beginning of the “summer of Caesar,” promising a wave of sanctions designations under the newly activated Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act. Summer has come and gone, but there’s little to show for it.

The Caesar Civilian Protection Act sanctions on Syria, which were signed into law by U.S. President Donald Trump in December and took effect on June 17, have polarized the international community. Most European countries have supported the Caesar Act’s use of sanctions to punish Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for war crimes, but Russia and China have stridently criticized the legislation.

Landlocked Afghanistan has begun using the Chinese-operated Pakistani port of Gwadar for transit trade — a development Pakistani officials see as marking the start of Gwadar’s role as a gateway port through the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor. Pakistan’s hope to develop the Arabian Sea port into a gateway for Afghanistan, Central Asia, and China’s Xinjiang region has been a long-standing one — and it is misguided. Islamabad should instead focus on local drivers to build the port and use it as a vehicle to develop the impoverished, but resource-rich region of southern Balochistan.