ISDEI Instituto de Seguridad, Defensa y Estudios Internacionales

Written by  Israel Shamir ; Originally appeared at  The Unz Review A few days ago, an Ilyushin IL-62M liner  carried  over a hundred Russian soldiers and officers to Caracas. Symbolically, they made a stopover in Syria, as if saying that Venezuela is the next country after Syria to be saved from ruin and dismemberment. The military mission was led by the Head of General Staff, General Tonkoshkurov (“Thin-Skinned”, a name that would thrill Vladimir Nabokov). ‘Don’t you dare, exclaimed John Bolton, meddle in the Western Hemisphere! Hands off Venezuela! It is our back yard!’ The Russians didn’t buy it. Some time ago they tried to object to the US tanks being positioned in Estonia, a brief drive from St Petersburg, and all they’ve got was preaching that sovereignty means sovereignty, and Estonia does not have to ask for Russian permission to receive American military assistance. Now they repeated this American sermon verbatim to John Bolton and his boss. Get out of ...

Arms Wonders For Local Wars   Rhodesia, the predecessor state of modern Zimbabwe, had a relatively short, but interesting history. The Rhodesian Bush War, which raged from from 1965 to 1979, led not only to the creation of the independent state of Zimbabwe, but also gave rise to multiple technical innovations in the art of war. The need for these DIY-style solutions, some of which later went into serial production, was the result of a strict sanctions regime and arms embargo which forced Rhodesians to invent different ways and tools to defend their own lives, property and vehicles as well as various means of offense.  A glut of makeshift self-defense means among Rhodesians started with Ken Goosen who built a DIY four-barrel single use shotgun to defend his homestead in Claremont (near Bulawayo). It was named Kill Quick. The device had four short 12 bore shotgun barrels lined up as a fan. While un...