ISDEI Instituto de Seguridad, Defensa y Estudios Internacionales

Written by  LeDahu ; Originally appeared at  thesaker.is After a brief interlude due to professional reasons, please find below the first part of an article on the Russian Navy, on the latest generation of frigates and the technological advances that has enabled Russian sea power to be noticed globally. This is article is partly in response to the original article, “New, Blue-Water Frigates to Become Main Surface Vessels of the Russian Navy”,  back in the summer, written by an Ukrainian naval officer for the Jamestown Foundation and widely circulated on social media. To save the readers too much trouble, the Russian naval capabilities are mostly presented in a negative light, and yet at the same time over exaggerates the Russian Navy’s overall ambitions.  [NB  Typical Western commentator framing of Russian military] . The author devotes a chunk of the article on the woes of operating the “Admiral Kuznetsov” aircraft carrier. The author also slants his ...

Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud is planning to relinquish power in favor of his son, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, within the next two days, the UK-based Rai al-Youm newspaper reported on November 8. The report didn’t reveal the source of the information, or provided any further details. Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is the son of King Salman,  the two launched an “anti-corruption” campaign back on November 4.  The campaign targeted dozens of Saudi officials in the government and the army, and several members of the Saudi royal family. Many analysts said that the real aim of the “anti-corruption” campaign is to strengthen the grip of Prince Mohammed bin Salman so he would face no opposition from the Saudi royal family when he became the king. It was previously reported that many members of the Saudi royal family objected the appointment of Prince Mohammed bin Salman as the Saudi Crown Prince because he is only 32 years old, which is very unusual in th...

The USS Enterprise is underway with the Enterprise Carrier Strike Group in the Atlantic Ocean. US Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist Seaman Harry Andrew D. Gordon/Released US President Trump has repeatedly promised to deal with North Korea, whether as a presidential candidate during the 2016 elections with hefty promises of  protecting  South Korea from its big bad brother, or as fully fledged President  promising fire and fury  in case Kim Jong-Un even looks at the US funny. Trump is exceptionally skilled at making promises, although keeping them may not be his forte. During his year of Presidency the only successful move against North Korea was tightening  UN sanctions  on the country, which is Trump’s achievement only partially at best. Even then, North Korea did not seem deterred, apparently continuing to  grow  its military and nuclear power, despite the US  deploying  its THAAD systems in South Korea. And that nu...

Over the weekend, Saudi King Salman shocked the world by abruptly announcing the  arrests of 11 senior princes  and some 38 ministers, including Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal, the world’s sixty-first richest man and the largest shareholder in Citi, News Corp. and Twitter. The purge was orchestrated by a new “supreme committee” to investigate public corruption created by King Salman but under the control of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who chairs the committee and is widely suspected of being the driving force behind the purge. In addition to the arrests,  two Royals  have died since the purge began. Prince Mansour bin-Muqrin reportedly perished in a helicopter crash near the Yemen border earlier this week, and Prince Abdul Aziz bin Fahd – killed during a firefight as authorities attempted to arrest him. For all the chaos, Saudi Arabia is benefiting from the climb in oil prices over the past week. However, signs of stress are showing up elsewhere in regional ...