Adverse

A People’s Liberation Army Type 59 tank weighs 36 tons, but on June 4th, 1989 a man stopped one in its tracks. This Saturday marks […] More

Two weeks have passed since the close of North Korea’s 7th Workers’ Party Congress and, for the moment, the country’s streak of provocations that kicked […] More

Following the conclusion of North Korea’s 7th Workers’ Party Congress, many questions remain regarding the future direction of economic and foreign policies. The Cipher Brief […] More

Amidst the fanfare of North Korea’s 7th Workers’ Party Congress, Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un’ promotion to Party Chairman was one of the few substantive […] More

The 7th North Korean Workers’ Party (WPK) Congress –the first event of its kind in 36 years– began and ended with the flair for the […] More

North Korea held its Seventh Workers’ Party Congress last week. The primary focus of the Congress was to consolidate Kim Jong-un’s domestic power base and […] More

North Korea’s first Party Congress in three decades, a grand spectacle at which Kim Jong-un’s greatest achievement seems to have been giving himself the newly-created […] More

Fiery Cross Reef, a contested geographic feature in the South China Sea, is the latest site for the growing maritime tensions between China and the […] More

China sent a major signal to the U.S. last week, when it turned away the USS John C. Stennis aircraft carrier and accompanying vessels from […] More

China’s President Xi Jinping has committed himself to the country’s development as a maritime power and to protecting its sovereignty. One can reasonably assume that […] More

China’s neighbors are gravely concerned about what they see as a clear and determined strategy being implemented by Xi Jinping, the leader of the Chinese […] More

Among Republican frontrunner Donald Trump’s array of foreign policy positions is the suggestion that South Korea and Japan develop nuclear weapons for their own security […] More

North Korea’s nuclear saber rattling is raising concerns about further proliferation in the region.  There is a risk that should they feel sufficiently threatened by […] More

The Cipher Brief: Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan have the technical ability to pursue nuclear weapons, but all three have refrained. What conditions would have […] More

On April 15, Qasem Soleimani, the head of Iran’s elite Quds Force, traveled to Moscow for talks with Russian political and military officials regarding the […] More

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) is an ideological military force that, since its creation, has been involved in virtually every facet of Iranian politics, […] More

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) was formed shortly after the 1979 revolution that ousted the U.S.-backed Shah Reza Pahlavi. According to the Iranian Constitution, […] More

If Xi Jinping is the father and China’s people are his children, then Xi’s parenting style is definitely based on discipline rather than trust.  The […] More