Search: “Iran”

Have you been following the tortuous twists and turns surrounding the brutal torture, killing and apparent dismemberment of Saudi journalist and critic Jamal Kashoggi at the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul on October 2?  Can you make sense of all the claims and counterclaims?  Do you know who ‘did’ the deed?  If you answer yes to […]

This piece appeared in The Hill Times on October 29, 2018 Now that we are two weeks and counting away from the ‘incident’ involving Saudi dissident Jamal Kashoggi at the Kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul I have lost track of how many versions of the story we have received from our Saudi ‘friends’.  First Mr. Kashoggi […]

Do you know the old saying “Fool me once, shame on  you.  Fool me twice, shame on me”?  It refers to the notion that we may be hoodwinked by an unscrupulous character once for no fault of our own (aside from having a poor judge of character perhaps), but if we have the wool pulled […]

You gotta hand it to MBS, the power behind the throne in Saudi Arabia.  Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman, son of the current king, has sure made a name for himself of late.  Letting women drive.  Promising a new future for his country with shiny impressive technological cities and the like. Corruption has been nipped in […]

Pity the poor ex head of state, whether that person is a prime minister, a president, a monarch or a dictator, who settles for retirement,  although I’ d wager that many former dictators never get that far.  At one time you are cock of the rock. Everyone listens to you.  You get really cool perks […]

If there is one country that is garnering the headlines for all the good reasons these days (as opposed to Trump’s US for all the – well you know what I mean) it is Saudi Arabia.  The cradle of Islam has best been known for confirming the maxim “there is no FUN in FUNdamentalism” as […]

To say that Canada-US relations are going through a rough spot now would be a slight understatement.  Trade tariffs.  A disastrous Canada-led G7, due mostly to the ?performance? of the US President.  Accusations that Canada burned down the White House during the War of 1812: an amazing feat for a country that was not born […]

This piece appeared in The Hill Times on April 23, 2018 Way back when I was an analyst at CSE I recall a conversation with an workmate about who was more important to the organisation (we were both young and full of piss and vinegar).  He worked on the ‘Soviet problem’: I was assigned along […]

I know I have gone over this material before but there is nothing like an anniversary to occasion yet another look at an incident.  The ‘incident’ I am referring to is the 15th anniversary of the US decision to invade Iraq in 2003.  No matter what side of the political spectrum you belong to I […]

You gotta feel for the Kurds, history’s version of ‘always a bridesmaid, never a bride’.  Oft described as the world’s largest ethnic group without a country to call their own, the Kurds have come ever so close on several occasions.  They were kinda promised autonomy following the breakup of the Ottoman Empire in the post […]