Jihadist expansion into West Africa will take time

Significance While the overall number of incidents is fewer than a dozen since the rise of the region's jihadist insurgencies in the early 2010s, the trend lends credence to growing warnings about the jihadist threat to coastal West African countries. Concern has focused on Ivory Coast and Benin, but there is also nervousness about Ghana, Togo and even Senegal. Impacts Western governments will boost security assistance to coastal states. Intelligence sharing and joint operations will not forestall cross-border hit-and-run attacks. Most regional states will resort to security-focused responses whose abuses drive jihadist recruitment.

Ideology, positionality and war

The objective of this article is to explore issues of ideology in situations of interpreting in conflict zones. Research into interpreting in conflict zones is quite recent and has shed light on interesting aspects. Ideology is clearly present in war situations and may condition the interpreter’s role. This article seeks to identify examples of power relations and ideology by drawing on the narratives of five local interpreters who worked with Spanish troops stationed in Afghanistan as part of the International Security Assistance Force between 2003 and 2015. The narratives were collected using a semi-structured interview technique. The findings indicate that ideology is reflected in the interpreters’ perception of their own role as agents working for the good of their country against a common enemy, even though they were potentially perceived by both sides in the conflict as possible traitors. The traditional narrative of the interpreter as an invisible and impartial facilitator of communication would not appear to be applicable in this context.

Ghana: The Military in Transition From Praetorianism to Democratic Control

With the end of the Cold War and onset of democratization, the academic field of “civil–military relations” (CMR) has arguably gone into relative decline, replaced by the new global template of “Security Sector Reform and Governance” (SSR/G). This is a notable shift in several senses: firstly, from a narrow focus on the military (and coups in particular) to the “security sector” as a whole; and secondly because the two “fields” have been driven by different imperatives, priorities, and methodologies, in part shaped by changing historical contexts. In contrast to the CMR scholarship, SSR/G has been much more of a “policy and operational science” than an academic discipline, primarily oriented toward norm development and formal institution building in response to imperatives of democratization. This “policy praxis”—driven by sovereign actors and often delivered by consultants and private contractors with a primarily technical focus—has not always prioritized evidence-based research or interrogated real power dynamics. And while the nation-state remains the core actor, external powers (bilateral partners and international and multilateral institutions) have emerged as a critical supporting cast in SSR/G, evolving their own normative and policy frameworks and providing the financial resources to drive reforms (paradoxically, these are usually the same powers that conduct humanitarian interventions and extend security assistance to contain the proliferation of terrorist attacks in the region). Nevertheless, there are strong linear links between the two “disciplines,” as CMR legacies have shaped the SSR discourse and agenda. An offshoot of the SSR focus has been the implementation of practical programs to address some of the weaknesses of the defence sector exposed in the CMR literature, evident in a set of technical and “how to” tools, such as defence reviews, security sector public expenditure reviews, the “Defence Anti-Corruption Index” (pioneered by Transparency International), and a variety of “toolkits” designed to enhance military professionalism and strengthen civilian oversight bodies and institutions. Academic research has also reflected this shift by broadening out from the analysis of the military and coups to encompass other agencies in the formal security sector (police and intelligence in particular), as well as looking much more closely at nonstate security and justice providers and their interaction with state security institutions and actors, through the prism of concepts such as “hybridity” and “hybrid security governance.” Even so, militaries per se have never strayed far from the center of the discussion. Militaries have not only remained the focal point of SSR efforts—in the process even acquiring new roles and missions and (undoubtedly) sources of influence—they have even been propelled back to center stage, as the security landscape has shifted and African states and armies (particularly in the Sahel) have struggled against a growing proliferation of armed groups and terrorist attacks, and as coups have threatened to make a comeback. However, both the theory and practice of these African transitions defy neat delineations and linear interpretations. Their many commonalities notwithstanding, these transitions have been multifaceted, ambiguous, and contested, as well as fragile and subject to reversal, nowhere more so than in the CMR arena. Nevertheless, three elements stand out: 1. A growing trend over time toward “illiberal democracies,” as a variety of African leaders have made willful efforts to hollow out democracy, cultivating or (over time) perfecting the tools to evade or erode the strictures of democracy, an activity in which security forces are increasingly implicated. 2. A consensus in both the academic and policy literature about the fragile foundations of CMR in these transitions, which have been replete with “democratic deficits” and operational weaknesses, addressed only selectively by SSR, and likely to be further aggravated by the trends toward “soft authoritarianism” in the region. 3. Importantly, democratization in the region has coincided with (if not spawned) a proliferation of terroristic activity and new forms of armed conflict which African states have been unable to contain, triggering “humanitarian interventions” and security assistance from a variety of external actors. This has been dubbed the new “global militarism,” accompanied by a reorientation (rollback) of SSR in favor of “hard security” and operational capacity building (“Train and Equip”).

Peeking into Afghan's history: A study from 1988 to 2010

The study will elaborate the Afghan historical events that took place right after the Geneva accord of 1988 when USSR forces pullout from the country till 2010. The article will explain the emergence of the Taliban and their establishment of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. Moreover, the paper will elaborate on the Taliban's nexus with al-Qaeda and their efforts to settle them in Afghanistan. Furthermore, this particular research tends to analyse the US retaliation and war on terror after the catastrophic event of 9/11. Additionally, the paper will illustrate the launching of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and the Taliban's bloody resurgence and their belligerence after the said mission. Consequently, the research will examine Obama's administration war strategies and tactics after his presidential victory over John McCain.

Russia–China–Pakistan Engagement in the Changing Global Context: Scrutinizing the Realist Logic of a Trilateral ‘Axis’

Russia’s robust engagement with China coupled with the recalibration of its ties with Pakistan, coming at the backdrop of Russia’s increasing estrangement with the West, Pakistan’s dissatisfaction with the USA over the suspension of security assistance, and India’s closeness toward the latter are leading scholars and political analysts to remark that Russia, China, and Pakistan are gradually inching toward the formalization of an ‘axis’ or a strategic ‘counter alliance’ in a bid to push for a greater bipolarity in world affairs. Though there are not enough signs to prove that Russia–China–Pakistan ‘axis’ is a reality, what is of significance is the emergence of converging interests among these three states that is gradually leading toward deeper engagements among them. It is in this broader context that the article will endeavor to analyze the factors propelling such a development and seek to discern the possible implications it may have on the time-tested ties between Russia and India. The study will move beyond the realist concepts of a power-centric and relative-gain approach that presents this trilateral engagement as a ‘counter alliance’ to the USA and India’s supremacy in the region; instead the article argues that the factors as presented in the realist narratives are inadequate to explain the nature of Russia–China–Pakistan engagement in the light of (a) Russia’s invested relationship with India that is steeped in historical nostalgia which makes it highly unlikely for Russia to turn against the latter; (b) second, Russia’s tactical relationship with Pakistan inevitably weakens one leg of the so-called axis; (c) third, Russia’s robust partnership with China invalidates the realist argument that Russia retains an interest in countering China’s growing status as a countervailing power in the region; (d) fourth, the ‘other’ ( i.e., the USA and India) vis-à-vis which the realists attempt to posit the Russia–China–Pakistan ‘axis’ as a counter strategic alliance is itself noninstitutionalized and fraught with many challenges.