SFS News

Two major candidates are running for president in Nigeria: the incumbent, Muhammadu Buhari, of the All Progressive Congress (APC) and Atiku Abubakar, People’s Democratic Party (PDP). Associate professor Ken Opalo said: “[Buhari’s] been unwell, he hasn’t been as bold as he had promised in terms of needed reforms that could push the Nigerian economy, and despite his personal record as a non-corrupt person, there’s definitely lots of corrupt people around him.”

Even with the government shutdown over, there are still concerns regarding retention, morale, finances of diplomats and their families, and more. According to Nancy McEldowney, the shutdown’s impacts sent a message to State Department employees: “What it said to many people is, our work is not valued, our contributions are not wanted, why should I work in a place that doesn’t care about what I do — whether I come to work or not?”

In this article published on Newsweek, Professor Bruce Hoffman discusses Iran’s “crazy obsession” with the National Council of Resistance of Iran, a political front of the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq, or MEK. According to Hoffman, Iran’s obsession is “divorced from reality,” because while the MEK is indeed “a subversive threat, so are other groups.”

In this article published by AP News, Professor Daniel Byman discusses the rise of pan-Arab nationalists, who Byman said “see themselves often as critical of religion because religion is ‘backward.’ It’s what’s been holding the Arab world back.” Byman added, “that’s kind of the dominant divide, and Islamists of all stripes are pushing back against this.”

Considering the indictment of Huawei, US-China relations have been rockier than ever. SFS Professor Marc Busch pointed out that technology is “at the heart of the debate.” Trump also imposed a $200 billion tariff on Chinese goods, and recent incidents of intellectual property theft have also caused issues. SFS Professor Marc Busch said: “Politically you can run against trade because trade has this one convenient feature of coming with a flag. So a Trump or an elected official can look competent by identifying the source of all evil as being trade with Mexico. It’s hard to rail against your iPhone.”

In this article published by Lake Shore Public Radio, Professor Matthew Kroenig describes the recent resurgence of U.S. interest in battlefield nukes. These smaller, more strategic battlefield weapons were stockpiled by both the U.S. and the Soviet Union during the Cold War, at a time when both sides assumed the future of combat would involve the utilization of these lower yield nuclear weapons. After the Cold War, though, the U.S. “dismantled nearly all its battlefield nuclear weapons” while Russia “took a different path” and “kept thousands of battlefield nukes.” Discussing why the U.S. has returned to their efforts of battlefield nuke development, Kroenig explained the U.S. needs a third method of recourse besides “backing down to avoid nuclear war” or “retaliating with…large strategic nuclear weapons, potentially risking a larger nuclear attack” in the event that Russia was to use some of its stockpiled battlefield nukes.