Monthly briefings on current issues in international defence and security and the military sciences. Issue: Oct 2004, Vol. 24, No. 10
Russia's tragic failure
As the Russian response to the recent vicious wave of terrorist attacks indicates, the country remains utterly unprepared, and will continue to suffer as long as it is run by an incompetent, chaotic bureaucracy.
Jonathan Eyal
Lessons of Terror in the Caucasus
The attack carried out in North Ossetia is one more example of the process which Bin Laden and his associates has long aspired for to transform local national conflicts into religious ones as part of his global international terrorism.
Yoram Schweitzer and Sari Goldstein Ferber
Russia Insists Upon Preventive Strikes: The Possible Options
When General Baluevsky, the new chief of Russian General Staff, declared on 8 September that Russia could deliver preventive strikes on terrorist bases anywhere in the world, most experts saw in that either an attempt to draw attention away from the dismal performance of security services in Beslan or simply a strategic bluff.
Dr. Pavel K. Baev
Dramatic change in the leadership of Indonesia
The presidential runoff on 20 September 2004, between Megawati Sukarno Putri and Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY), marked another watershed on Indonesia’s road to full democracy.
Ivar Hellberg