Oriental Review

USA Used Tactical Nuclear Weapons in Afghanistan and Iraq

By Leonid SAVIN (Russia)

It became clear after the Seoul nuclear summit that the USA sticks to the old policy that goes back to 1945 – to monopolize the right to use nuclear weapons by making their non-proliferation part of international law in combination with new restrictive measures against others including Russia. It all should lead to the return [...]

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NATO in Afghanistan: Do They Stay Or Do They Go?

By Andrey ILYASHENKO (Russia)

Despite the fact that the U.S. has officially announced the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan in 2014, things are coming so that they will remain there. The question, in what status, with what rights and, more importantly, with what goal – increasingly concerns the neighbors of Afghanistan: Russia, China, and Central Asia. An agreement on [...]

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Active Endeavour and Drug Trafficking

By ORIENTAL REVIEW

We all are aware of the basic frameworks of the US response to barbaric 9/11 terrorist attacks. The Bush’s administration and NATO launched unprecedented media, diplomatic and military campaigns aimed to suppress the adversary inside its haunt in Afghanistan. But few remember that the US Operation Enduring Freedom and NATO’s International Security Assistance Force weren’t [...]

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Russia and US Clash Over Afghan Drug Trafficking

By Alexander SHUSTOV (Russia)

This month Washington whose commitment to fighting drug production in the US occupied Afghanistan is widely called into question rolled out a new plan of coordinating the activities of Central Asian republic’s anti-narcotic agencies. The initiative was, however, promptly blocked as potentially counterproductive by Russia, the country hit hardest by the Afghan drug output. In [...]

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What the Taliban Readiness to Talk Means for Afghanistan

By Najmuddin A. SHAIKH (Pakistan)

The Taliban spokesman’s announcement that the Taliban are prepared to open an office in Doha Qatar and to hold talks with the Americans at that site has been the headline story in the international media for the last few days. The fact that this very spokesman, commenting on the disgusting video of American marines urinating [...]

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Obama’s Byzantine Style in the ‘Greater Middle East’

By ORIENTAL REVIEW

For the last few years the incumbent US administration was getting adhered to a new, more sophisticated principle in foreign policy: to act overseas by means of its allies and to promote American initiatives as multilateral through the international organizations. Thus, the war against Libya was unleashed by France, and the US was carrying out [...]

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US Drug War Against Russia Waged From the Asian Foothold

By Nil NIKANDROV (Russia)

The US intelligence community launched its first drug attacks against Russia in the early 1990s, an epoch when drastic reforms were bleeding Russia’s law enforcement agencies and the borders of the formerly insulated country became easy to cross for envoys of Western drug cartels. The Russian customs and border-guard services which inherited from the Soviet [...]

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Karzai’s Loya Jirga

By Najmuddin A. SHAIKH (Pakistan)

President Karzai and his government hailed the Loya Jirga, a 2030 strong assemblage of parliamentarians and notables from across the country, as a great success. Certainly it could be deemed a success that the Taliban despite the threats they held out were not able to prevent participation nor were they able to launch any attacks [...]

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Nangarhar Attack: Pentagon Sabotaging the White House

By Peter CHAMBERLIN (USA)

Nangarhar is the secured province that is being turned over to Afghan forces, where the border incident has erupted. The attack upon Pakistan was intended as a demonstration for the world to see the dangers of an early Afghan transition and withdrawal. What else could explain this Afghan unit gaining command over Nangarhar Province on [...]

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Taliban’s New Strategy

By Aurobinda MAHAPATRA (India)

If Taliban head Mullah Omar’s recent Eid ul-Fitr (marking end of Muslim holy month Ramadan) speech serves any indication – it is Taliban’s latest strategy to regroup and enhance its prospects to rule Afghanistan but in a new format…Besides some of the high sounding and oft repeated slogans such as establishing Islamic rule, Omar’s call [...]

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Changing Dynamics in the Af-Pak

By Aurobinda MAHAPATRA (India)

The visit of Admiral Mike Mullen, the Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff to China and later to Afghanistan towards in July have given rise to speculations about the probable coming together of the two powers to adopt an accommodative approach on various issues including Afghanistan…Though it is difficult to agree completely that [...]

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Smashing Greater Central Asia

By Peter CHAMBERLIN (USA)

After ten years of raging warfare in Afghanistan, watching the fight slowly ooze across the invisible Durand Line into Pakistan, we have the right to wonder whether the war is any closer to ending today?  It is  perfectly reasonable to suspect that if we were allowed to know the truth we would understand that the [...]

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