Search the official photographs of Chinese state occasions across three decades and you will find him. A few steps back, slightly to the side, watching. A lean man in a dark suit whose face, in image after image, carries the same expression. No performance of confidence. No display of authority. Something quieter and harder to name: total attention. The attention of a man who has decided that his job is to see clearly and that being seen interferes with seeing.

The Architect of the Long Why

BY FLAVIO M.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s recent summit in Ankara has produced a decision that demands scrutiny. NATO member states have committed to providing Ukraine with military assistance worth €70 billion for 2026. This is not an emergency measure. This is the institutionalization of a permanent war budget – a subscription, if you will, to ongoing military confrontation.

The war must go on: NATO plans for no endgame

Long-term military support for Ukraine has become a routine policy, showing Brussels and Washington don’t see peace as an option

Published 17 Jul, 2026

By Kirill Kalinin

Earlier this week, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, together with video and press statements, that the United States would be undertaking an effort to dismantle the International Criminal Court (ICC), “brick by brick if necessary.” We and others responded to this statement here.

Nations’ new ways of working together, Xi’s nuclear deterrent display, scandal probe’s link to scandal probe, South China Sea’s geopolitical reality, Korean company’s record market listing, and the region’s shadow baby trade.

The journey this month by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Indonesia, Australia and New Zealand marks the consolidation of a new approach to the Indo-Pacific, one that might be called ‘G Minus Two’.

David Armstrong

We all know what an elastic does. We use elastic daily. Some we see, some we don’t — like those in our socks. The main characteristic is that an elastic can stretch under stress but will come back to its original shape once we let it go. Much of the politics of global warming are static while trying to minimise the stress as if our belief was more like a stone that can bend a little bit. My personal experience is that even reinforced concrete can flex. But not much.

A simplified study of global warming

By Gus Leonisky

Both a stone and an elastic can break. In metallurgy, tensility of metal is measured by stretching bars to the point they thin-out, then break. We use various alloys in steel and other metals according to what we need in regard to having measured the forces needed to break the bars. Engineering 101.

In 1928, a young British physicist named Paul Dirac set out to solve a great puzzle in physics: how to make the new quantum theory of the atom play nicely with Einstein’s theory of special relativity. Quantum mechanics described the weird behavior of electrons and other particles at the atomic scale, while relativity governed high speeds and energies. The two theories were individually successful but philosophically at odds. Dirac’s quest was nothing short of unification – a single equation that could describe an electron moving close to the speed of light, obeying both quantum mechanics and relativity.

Dirac's Equation and the Birth of Antimatter

BY OMID ZARE

PEN America, an organization founded to defend persecuted and censored writers, has once again made a mockery of itself with its call to protect Israeli writers from discrimination.

Yes. Israeli writers.

Its most recent screed, “A Silent Moratorium,” is so tone deaf and embarrassing that it triggered a widespread backlash. PEN America’s president, Dinaw Mengestu, resigned in protest.

PEN America Sells out. Again.

PEN America, once a fearless advocate on behalf of persecuted writers around the globe, has become a shill for Zionism and American imperialism.

Politics and institutions are increasingly governed by risk management, not leadership. But real leadership requires imagination, courage and the willingness to challenge false stories.

Of course there are Trump, Netanyahu, Putin, Xi, Kim, and the Ayatollahs, who run their worlds according to their own story line, but none in any meaningful way serve democracies. But are they leaders? Leaders act and think transformationally. These guys, especially Trump, are interested only in transactions that further their storyline.

George Browning

[SEE GUS's COMMENT AT THE END.......]

The focus of Block 3 of the Royal Commission into Antisemitism and Social Cohesion was on online hate but the commission did not hear about the hate directed at pro-Palestinian groups. 

How can the “discomfort” felt by certain Zionists when they see a keffiyeh or hear pro-Palestine peace slogans be more serious than the mutilation and murder of tens of thousands of children? More important than the unspeakable suffering of an entire people being dehumanised, dispossessed and erased from their land, culture and history? More pressing than the escalation towards an all-out war?

Jepke Goudsmit

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's surprise move to replace popular Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov has caused an outburst of anger from civil society and protests from MPs.

A crowd of mostly young people gathered in Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities on Thursday morning, holding up signs reading "Hands off Fedorov" and "Stop sabotaging victory!" and chanting "Shame!".

By evening, Zelensky had put forward the name of Maj-Gen Yevhenii Khmara, the acting head of the Security Service (SBU), as acting defence minister.

Israel’s relentless expansion of illegal settlements into the West Bank and East Jerusalem while the E.U., U.S. and Britain look the other way has left any hope of a two-state solution in tatters.

For decades, the E.U. has devised ever more convoluted ways to avoid penalising Israel’s illegal settlements, even as they devour a two-state solution it claims is the only path to regional peace

If I asked you to cut off your arm, would you do it?

What if I pointed out that that your arm regularly punched a neighbour in the face so violently that it broke their nose and teeth, and left them unconscious? Would you cut your arm off then?

Jonathan Cook: Two-State Solution Was Always a Sham

The British government has announced it is going to ban Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, an idea which on the face of it sounds ridiculous.

The IRGC is the primary military branch of another country tasked with defending that country from hostile aggressors.

Soon It Will Be Illegal To Oppose Imperialism

Nate Bear Do Not Panic

GusNote: In 2004, a book from a Pentagon analyst/insider was published with no shame. This is what the blurb about it said:

Since the end of the Cold War, America's national security establishment has been searching for a new operating theory to explain how this seemingly "chaotic" world actually works. Gone is the clash of blocs, but replaced by what?

Hong Kong —  China is struggling to offset economic challenges both at home and abroad, as its economy grew at a slower-than-expected pace in the second quarter of the year.

On Wednesday, China’s National Bureau of Statistics said the economy grew 4.3% in the quarter ending June 30, compared to the same period a year ago.

China misses growth target for first time since Covid as Iran turmoil roils global trade

By Stephanie Yang