Showing 131 - 140 of 343
Softly, softly the right tactic for nuke deal
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 27/02/2019
» On a scale of one to 10, what are the chances that the meeting between Chairman Kim Jong-un and President Donald Trump in Vietnam today and tomorrow (or any subsequent meeting) will end with a clear and irreversible commitment to the "denuclearisation" of North Korea? Zero.
India-Pakistan: Maybe war, but not a water war
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 01/03/2019
» After the terrorist attack on Indian troops in Kashmir two weeks ago that killed 40 Indian soldiers, but before Tuesday's retaliatory air strikes across the border into Pakistan by the Indian Air Force, the Indian government did something unprecedented. It threatened to cut off Pakistan's water. Or at least, it sounded like that.
Magnetic reversal: Don't panic
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 08/02/2019
» For a moment there I thought we had a new global threat to deal with, alongside the old favourites like climate change, nuclear war and pandemics. This would have been welcome from a journalistic point of view, since there is a constant need for scary new topics to write about. Otherwise we would fail in our primary task, which is to provide material to hold the ads apart.
Trump and Erdogan -- the bringers of chaos
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 18/01/2019
» 'Where America retreats, chaos follows," said US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in Cairo last week. It's not the sort of remark you'd expect from an American diplomat only three weeks after President Donald Trump declared that US troops were pulling out of Syria. Is it possible that behind Mr Pompeo's severe and even pompous exterior there lurks a secret ironist?
Afghanistan: 17 years too late
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 31/01/2019
» 'The Taliban have committed, to our satisfaction, to do what is necessary that would prevent Afghanistan from ever becoming a platform for international terrorist groups or individuals," said Zalmay Khalilzad, the US Special Representative for Afghanistan Reconciliation, on Tuesday. So why didn't the United States have this discussion with the Taliban 17 years ago, in October 2001?
The Great Dying, the Little Ice Age, and little old us
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 06/02/2019
» The Black Death killed about 30% of the European population in a few years in the middle of the 14th century. A century and a half later the native people of the Americas were hit by half a dozen plagues as bad as the Black Death, one after another, and 95% of them died. The plagues of the "Great Dying" had much less terrifying names like measles, influenza, diphtheria and smallpox, but they were just as efficient at killing.
The Kurds: Betrayed once more
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 23/12/2018
» The Kurds are like Kleenex. You use them, and then you throw them away.
Bangladesh returns to 1-party state
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 03/01/2019
» It always looks bad when the ruling party jails the opposition leader just a few months before the election. If only Khaleda Zia, leader of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), had decided to boycott this election like she did the last one, she'd probably still be a free woman. But she decided to run, and so was sentenced to jail time on various implausible corruption charges.
China and Taiwan following a well-rehearsed script
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 05/01/2019
» 'Independence for Taiwan would only bring profound disaster to Taiwan," said China's President Xi Jinping in Beijing on Wednesday, and he ought to know. He is the one who would make sure the disaster happened.
MBS playing with fire in Saudi's Game of Thrones
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 11/12/2018
» Now is the moment of maximum danger for Saudi Arabia's de facto ruler, Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman (MBS).