ArcaMax

Our murky, blood-soaked moment in time demands a new look at geopolitics -- specifically, what constitutes a strategically valuable position that in human terms is worth expending immense wealth and/or using violence to obtain or deny.

Understand the violence option means risking soldier sons' and daughters' lives in the struggle. Post-...Read more

The best time to fight a war is when you can win it.

Believing America is still economically innovative and its domestic market the world's biggest, the Trump administration has declared war on Big Debt (U.S. national debt). It is simultaneously pushing for the rapid revival and "reshoring" of the nation's withered, spotty and dangerously ...Read more

In mid-February, a firm representing a Democratic Republic of the Congo legislator contacted several U.S. officials. The recipients included Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

The letter sketched a sub-Saharan version of President Donald Trump's Ukraine minerals peace initiative. Would the U.S. be interested in acquiring or investing in Congo's ...Read more

The news hook title isn't as crisp as World War II's "Loose Lips Sink Ships." It does send the relevant 21st-century message that digital communication systems have security flaws enemies can exploit to gather critical information.

WWII's brilliant rhyme warned that loose talk in a New York bar could tell Nazi spies where to position U-boats ...Read more

On the morning of March 16, U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth told Fox News the latest U.S. airstrikes on Yemen's Houthi terrorists is a campaign "about freedom of navigation and restoring deterrence. The minute the Houthis say, 'We'll stop shooting at your ships, we'll stop shooting at your (U.S. recon) drones,' this campaign will end. ...Read more

Late on March 11, the Trump administration announced Ukraine had agreed to a 30-day ceasefire in the Russia-Ukraine War.

A joint American-Ukrainian statement said the U.S. will "immediately" resume full intelligence sharing and military-security aid to Ukraine. The Trump administration also said Ukraine had agreed to the strategic minerals ...Read more

During his remarkable March 4 address to Congress, President Donald Trump said this about his efforts to end the Russia-Ukraine War: "If you want to end wars, you have to talk to both sides."

That's the truth for would-be peacemakers in any era. For what it's worth, a 2002 peacemaking handbook sponsored by the Anglican Church of Kenya said as...Read more

The 21st century may well be the new age of privateers -- armed commercial sailors fighting pirates, terrorists and cartel criminals threatening offshore oil rigs.

Why hire private naval security? Because national navies and coast guards are stretched thin by lack of funding or threat of war. Or, in the case of the USA, vexed by short-sighted...Read more

The political hacks opposing the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) are laughable -- until you realize these hysterics present a serious threat to U.S. national security.

President Dwight Eisenhower's no longer with us, but we have his National Security Council 162/2 report, dated Oct. 30, 1953. Once top secret, it's now on the ...Read more

The island is named Diego Garcia, the biggest little island in the Indian Ocean's isolated Chagos Archipelago.

Never heard of it? Consult the map -- it's south of India and kinda sorta between Indonesia (Java) and East Africa (Tanzania).

Nowhere? Recall the real estate agent's lingo for valuable acreage: Location, Location, Location.

In our...Read more

The Great 21st-Century Creative Strategic Thinker (Donald Trump, aka, The Great Disruptor) wants to make rubbled Gaza the Riviera of The Middle East.

That's a fair translation of what President Donald Trump said in a Feb. 4 news conference he held with Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu at the other podium.

Fantasy?

If you understand the threat ...Read more

President Donald Trump's Jan. 27 strategic defense executive order includes this hard-nosed truth about current air and space weaponry and our enemies who possess them: "Over the past 40 years, rather than lessening, the threat from next-generation strategic weapons has become more intense and complex with the development by peer and near-peer...Read more

Post-inauguration President Donald Trump repeated his Jan. 7 declaration that the U.S. should buy Greenland and regain control of the Panama Canal.

My Jan. 8 column addressed Greenland's strategic value in the defense of North America and the Arctic -- which is precisely why Trump wants to make certain China and Russia don't control it.

I ...Read more