Showing 1 - 10 of 11
America risks grand folly in Iran war
News, Thitinan Pongsudhirak, Published on 06/03/2026
» It is just the first week of the joint attack between the United States and Israel on the Islamic Republic of Iran, but the repercussions from the Middle East for the Indo-Pacific are already discernible.
Apec's geopolitics and geoeconomics
Oped, Thitinan Pongsudhirak, Published on 11/11/2022
» The upcoming leaders' meeting in Bangkok among the 21 member economies of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) should be seen in conjunction with its preceding Asean-related summits in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh and the G20 summit in Bali, the Indonesian island resort. This one-two-three combination in three Southeast Asian countries over a ten-day period is supposed to showcase Asean's central role in the promotion of peace, security and prosperity in the region and the wider world. But as Asean's summit season gets underway in Cambodia, excitement and promise have given way to anxieties and apprehensions. While these summit talks are an extraordinary opportunity to tone down geopolitical temperatures and geoeconomic competition, they are likely to yield mixed results.
Global politics in dangerous territory
Oped, Thitinan Pongsudhirak, Published on 02/09/2022
» While Russia's profound and transformational invasion of Ukraine on Feb 24 has fundamentally reshaped and reinforced contentious trends and contours in the geopolitics and geoeconomics of Asia, it did not set out a new direction in world politics. The international system had already been unravelling over the past decade, underpinned by the United States-China geostrategic rivalry and competition. Given deteriorating patterns and trends, the international environment is entering dangerous territory where what seemed unthinkable not long ago may soon appear to be very conceivable indeed.
Youth movement has staying power
Oped, Thitinan Pongsudhirak, Published on 07/08/2020
» As Thailand's youth movement for political change gathers momentum, it has already shown unprecedented trends and patterns. Moving forward, the conservative forces who oppose change and reform will likely train their sights on these young demonstrators to deny and derail them through manipulation and coercion. But this youth movement is unlikely to stop without a fight. These young men and women of high school and university age are here to stay for the long haul because their collective future, not just the ideology and ideals they espouse, is at stake.
Concentric Mideast wars and prospects
News, Thitinan Pongsudhirak, Published on 10/01/2020
» Nothing captures attention in an age of media saturation like the talk of war. The recent decision by US President Donald Trump to assassinate a top Iranian official, Quds Force Commander Major General Qassem Soleimani, has conjured up the spectre of a wider conflict encompassing not just the Middle East but the broader world, as Iran's top leaders deemed it "an act of war" and vowed "severe revenge". Although Iran's military and its proxy militias and client states in the Middle East and elsewhere are poised to exact retribution for their loss, we are unlikely to see a world war in the immediate aftermath of this killing.
What next with China as a superpower?
News, Thitinan Pongsudhirak, Published on 04/10/2019
» The spectacular celebrations to mark the People's Republic of China's 70th anniversary of its founding were the culmination of a sweeping ideological struggle over the past century between two competing systems of socio-economic and political organisation. Under the stewardship of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from 1921, China has now arrived as a 21st century superpower with an unprecedented hybrid of totalitarian control and a capitalist market economy, the successor state to the old Soviet Union whose demise nearly 30 years ago was attributable to its rigid collectivism over market capitalism.
5 years backwards under military rule
News, Thitinan Pongsudhirak, Published on 24/05/2019
» Now that five years have elapsed since Thailand's last military coup, it is an opportune juncture to take stock of where the country is heading. When it seized power in May 2014, the military junta, known as the National Council for Peace and Order, initially had legitimacy from royal ascent and broad approval from its restoration of stability and order after more than half a year of street protests in Bangkok by the People's Democratic Reform Committee that was intent on overthrowing the Pheu Thai government.
Facing up to Thailand's role as Asean chair
News, Thitinan Pongsudhirak, Published on 09/11/2018
» As Thailand gears up to chair Asean next year, a sense of deja vu is setting in. The last time Thailand held its rotational turn at Asean's helm from July 2008 to December 2009, it was undermined by domestic street protests that ended up disrupting top-level meetings and abruptly sending Asia-Pacific leaders home prematurely. Owning up to what transpired, it has to be said that the Thai hosting of Asean-centred summits back then was an utter fiasco.
Maintaining what's left of rules-based order
News, Thitinan Pongsudhirak, Published on 20/07/2018
» For anyone who is alive today, the world as we know it has never been so stirred and shaken. The international order based on a common set of institutions, rules and norms that used to be widely cherished and universally beneficial is unravelling before our collective and helpless eyes. From an emerging United States-China trade war and Beijing's militarised occupation of the South China Sea to Russia's revanchist annexation of Crimea, world order over the past several years has been breaking down. Those who once set the rules, principally the US, are breaking them, while aspiring new rule-setters, mainly China, have not found sufficient international reception. Rule-takers, such as the smaller states in Asean, suffer the most when set rules lose cohesion, lustre and abidance.
The Trump-Kim summit and its aftermath
News, Thitinan Pongsudhirak, Published on 15/06/2018
» The unprecedented and dramatic summit meeting between President Donald Trump and Chairman Kim Jong-un, the current leaders of the United States and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (otherwise known as North Korea), will go down in history as another case of "better the devil you know than the devil you don't". Since the Korean War stopped without a permanent truce in 1953, the world has become accustomed to the North Korean regime as a menace to regional peace and stability with ominous global ramifications because of its nuclear weapons.