Daniel DePetris

If you enjoyed the weeks-long intra-NATO spat about whether to send heavy tanks to Ukraine, then you’re going to love the ongoing kerfuffle about whether Sweden and Finland should be admitted into the transatlantic alliance. Whereas Germany was the lone holdout in the first instance, Turkey is the obstacle in the second — and going by the fiery words of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the squabble won’t end soon. Erdogan, in the midst of his toughest election campaign in two decades, has been using his veto over Sweden's and Finland’s NATO memberships to press both countries on one of his top priorities: cracking down on the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, a group Turkey, the US, and the European Union all label a terrorist organization.

Yoon Suk-yeol isn’t a household name in the United States, but his comments this week have put him in the international spotlight. Speaking at a press briefing on Wednesday, the South Korean president openly surmised that if North Korea’s nuclear weapons program continued unabated, Seoul may have to explore an option the United States wouldn’t like: producing nuclear weapons of its own. Referring to Pyongyang’s weapons programs, Yoon said, "It’s possible that the problem gets worse and our country will introduce tactical nuclear weapons or build them on our own. If that’s the case, we can have our own nuclear weapons pretty quickly, given our scientific and technological capabilities.” The remarks generated immediate pushback from nuclear security experts.

2019 was a banner year for Juan Guaidó, a relatively obscure Venezuelan lawmaker who announced to a crowd of thousands in the heart of Caracas that he, and he alone, was Venezuela’s new interim president. The United States and dozens of other countries in Europe and Latin America quickly followed up with official recognition for the fresh-faced head of the Venezuelan National Assembly. Nicolás Maduro, the man who took over the presidency after Hugo Chávez’s death, was for all intents and purposes relegated to the status of an isolated despot who had no legitimate claim to the Miraflores palace. 2022, however, has brought Guaidó and his international supporters back down to earth, with the opposition ditching his government in a 72-28 vote.

You don’t need to be an Asia specialist to recognize that China is undergoing a significant military modernization campaign. China’s leader, Xi Jinping, and the Chinese Communist Party are seeking to transform the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) into a world-class military by 2049, and complete the development of the military platforms, capabilities, enablers, and amphibious weapons systems necessary for a potential Taiwan contingency by 2027. Beijing’s defense budget rose by 139 percent between 2010 and 2020.

For US President Joe Biden, Saudi Arabia is the problem that never goes away. First came his decision to refrain from slapping penalties on Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman (MBS) following the kidnapping and murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, a former Saudi royal insider who became increasingly critical of the ruling family (the Biden administration did place travel restrictions on 76 other Saudi officials and sanctioned the elite Saudi intelligence force that carried out the operation).

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu haven’t really been on speaking terms. That is, until last weekend, when the two defense chiefs conversed with each other twice in three days. The readouts released by the Defense Department are about as brief as brief can get. They don’t tell us much about what was said, other than the general observation that Austin, a former four-star army general, swatted away Moscow’s explanations for the war in Ukraine. What the conversations illustrate more than anything is just how rare they've been. Indeed, the reason why so many news outlets wrote about the Austin-Shoigu calls was because they were extraordinary.

Every year in late September, the east side of Manhattan morphs into a giant sea of immovable cars. The culprit: the annual United Nations General Assembly debate, where diplomats from around the world fly to New York to shake hands, give speeches, and participate in dozens of side meetings and events throughout the city. This week’s UN General Assembly debate, however, is unique. For the first time since the UN was established after World War II, the meeting is occurring amid a large, deadly, conventional conflict in Europe. The war in Ukraine, which will cross its eight-month mark this Saturday, will dominate the session from beginning to end.

The Ukraine war’s first seven months have been a long slog, with high costs in both men and material. Then, over the last week of combat, that suddenly changed. While casualties undoubtedly remained high on both sides, the Ukrainian army’s surprise counteroffensive in the northeast shattered Russia’s defensive lines and culminated in the most humiliating Russian tactical defeat since its forces were pushed out of Kyiv in April. While Russian President Vladimir Putin was celebrating the opening of a new Ferris wheel in Moscow, his troops 534 miles to the south were dropping their weapons and retreating.