Khattar Singh and Zunes examine why the Trump administration may have misjudged Iran’s internal structure and resilience. Their discussion explores Iran’s military capabilities, the regional consequences of the war and the possibility that the conflict could settle into a prolonged war of attrition with global economic repercussions.

The limits of decapitation strategy

The conflict began with what the US described as precision strikes targeting Iranian leadership and military infrastructure. Some in Washington expected Khamenei’s death to create a power vacuum that might weaken or even collapse the regime.

Zunes argues that this expectation misunderstood how the Iranian political system actually works. Iran is not governed by a single leader whose removal would dismantle the state. Instead, the system functions through overlapping institutions that collectively sustain the regime.

“It’s not a matter of one-man rule where you could get rid of the bad guy and then things can open up,” Zunes says. He describes Iran as an oligarchic structure in which clerical authorities, state institutions and military organizations share power.

Perhaps the most important pillar of that system is the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Over decades, the IRGC has expanded its authority far beyond military functions, controlling major sectors of the economy and embedding itself throughout Iranian political life. Even after the loss of senior commanders in US strikes, Zunes notes that the organization’s leadership network “runs pretty deep,” making regime collapse unlikely.

Geography and the limits of war

A large-scale ground invasion of Iran remains improbable. Unlike Iraq, where US forces advanced rapidly across open terrain in 2003, Iran presents formidable geographic obstacles.

Iran is roughly three times larger than Iraq in both area and population and is dominated by mountainous terrain. This geography alone makes conventional invasion extremely difficult.

“Iran is a very mountainous country,” Zunes explains. It is not a place where mechanized forces could simply “roll your tanks through.”

As a result, the conflict is likely to remain an air and missile war rather than a conventional invasion. Both sides are increasingly striking infrastructure and urban areas as the initial strategy of targeted attacks fails to achieve decisive results.

Retaliation and regional risk

Iran’s response has expanded the battlefield across the wider Middle East. Missile and drone attacks have struck US bases as well as facilities in allied states including Israel and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Zunes finds Iran’s targeting choices noteworthy. Although the UAE hosts relatively limited US military infrastructure compared with countries like Qatar or Bahrain, Iranian forces have launched multiple strikes against it.

He suggests that the UAE may represent something symbolic in Iranian calculations. “The UAE symbolizes some of the worst excesses of an Arab Islamic state, and its ties to global capitalism and the United States,” he says.

At the same time, many Arab governments have avoided joining the US-Israeli strike campaign. Despite possessing advanced Western weapons systems and large military budgets, states such as Saudi Arabia and the UAE have kept their distance from direct participation outside of their own defense.

According to Zunes, regional leaders recognize that their populations are deeply uncomfortable with the sight of thousands of Muslims being killed by a US-led coalition. Public opinion and fears of domestic unrest are therefore constraining their involvement.

A war of attrition

As the fighting continues, both sides appear increasingly locked in a struggle of endurance rather than quick victory. Iran has sustained significant losses, including the destruction of naval assets and repeated attacks on missile infrastructure. Yet the country continues to launch retaliatory strikes.

Zunes believes Washington underestimated Iran’s ability to sustain this type of conflict. “The United States grossly underestimated Iran’s military capabilities and its ability to continue firing missiles even after significant losses,” he argues.

Simultaneously, American forces face their own constraints. Missile defense systems are under pressure, particularly in protecting regional allies from Iranian ballistic missiles and drones. Both sides may therefore be hoping the other will exhaust key resources first.

In such situations, conflicts often end in what analysts call a “hurting stalemate” — when neither side achieves its objectives and the costs become unsustainable.

Economic shock and political fallout

Beyond the battlefield, the war is already affecting the global economy. Roughly 20% of the world’s oil supply ships through the Strait of Hormuz, which has become a central pressure point in the conflict. Iranian strikes on regional energy infrastructure and the threat to maritime traffic have already pushed energy prices higher.

Zunes warns that prolonged disruption could ripple across the global economy. Oil is not only essential for transportation but also for fertilizer, plastics and countless industrial processes. Rising energy costs could therefore contribute to inflation and economic slowdown worldwide.

Domestically, the war also carries political consequences for the US. Polling cited during the conversation suggests unusually strong public opposition to the conflict. Zunes notes how even controversial wars, like the 2003 invasion of Iraq, had majority support once they got underway. US citizens tended to rally around the flag and “support our troops,” only to decline as more American casualties mounted, the goals remained elusive and it became clear there was no end in sight. This is the first time there has been such strong opposition at the outset. 

For Zunes, the larger problem is strategic rather than political. He argues that neither side can realistically achieve a decisive victory and that the war risks producing massive human and economic costs without a clear outcome.

In his view, this conflict resembles a natural disaster more than a traditional military campaign. Once unleashed, it may simply continue until both sides are exhausted.

[ edited this piece.]

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Looking into the records, a better proposal for the date of the GWOT may be February 12, 2012. That’s when, during Obama’s first term, Jake Sullivan, the State Department’s Director of Policy Planning, his boss, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, that “Al-Qaeda is on our side in Syria.” A mere decade after Osama Bin Laden’s attack on New York’s World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Sullivan could affirm that the group guilty of traumatizing the entire country had now become a precious ally.

Even with Al Qaeda on our side, all was not well. Not only had ISIS emerged, Iran was deemed the world’s greatest sponsor of terror. Obama, the peace president, having “solved” the Libya question in 2011 by launching a war and removing a dictator, Muammar Gaddafi, still had Iraq, Syria and Iran to deal with. 

On July 14, 2015, the United States, Europe, China and Russia signed the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action putting an end to the threat of Iran, one of the three partners of the Axis of Evil. We now know only too well how fleeting that moment of tranquillity was destined to become. 

The following year, real estate tycoon and television entertainer Donald Trump was elected president of the US. He wasted no time tossing the “Iran deal” in the scrapheap of history’s “bad ideas.” As a peace through strength president, he wanted to prove that the spirit of the crusade was still alive. Even if there was no need for overtly warlike action, he could focus on details such as assassinating Qasem Soleimani, the Iranian commander who had been Washington’s most effective ally in its ongoing crusade against ISIS in Iraq and Syria.

By January 2021, when Democrat Joe Biden moved into the Oval Office to replace Trump, the outgoing but defiant commander-in-chief began his four-year campaign to convince Americans anew that because he was angelically committed to peace, he deserved a second term. He cited the truly exceptional fact that during his first term, in contrast with all recent presidents, he hadn’t initiated any new wars. That was true. Instead of starting a new war, he had been content simply enjoying the inertia of the forever wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that fellow Republican Bush had bequeathed him.

The lesson we can draw from the history of our century’s war on terror is simple. When it comes to US foreign policy, nothing appears to be unambiguously certain. War can be peace; peace can be war. “Fair is foul; foul is fair,” as Macbeth’s witches observantly taught us.

On February 28, we had a new demonstration. “No wars” Trump, for the second time during his second term, without warning, ongoing negotiations with the Iranians, this time to decapitate their leadership. This should not be seen (according to him) as an act of unprovoked aggression because he did it “to defend the American people by eliminating imminent threats from the Iranian regime, a vicious group of very hard, terrible people.” We can read that last phrase as an updated gloss on Bush’s “axis of evil.”

Religion finally trumps ideology 

Americans and Europeans remember the wars of the 20th century as moments of great heroism that could on occasion be exceptionally brutal. World War I and World War II stood as the most memorable, but the Cold War achieved a nearly similar status. Those wars all held one thing in common: The victors justified them on ideological grounds, whether or not that was the true cause.

WWI began in ambiguous circumstances with the breakdown of formerly complicit relations among European colonial powers. When things got out of hand, US President Woodrow Wilson not only saved the day but inaugurated a great tradition by defining the stakes. He taught our enlightened populations that there’s something pernicious in the world opposed to our noble concept of democratic governance. It was all about defending ideals, not gaining an advantage. According to Wilson, the US and its allies had on “making the world safe for democracy.”

From that point on, the justification of any new war came to be the need to defeat a designated group of “hard, terrible people,” as Trump describes the latest enemy. The Nazis, Viet Cong, the Taliban, Islamist terrorists. The name of the groups might change, but creating the perception of the enemy as a hard, terrible people opposed to Western style democracy became the basis for war propaganda. For Trump in the latest iteration, the collective enemy that deserves the horror of carpet bombing is the population living under a specific theocratic regime in ancient Persia. 

Throughout most of the 20th century, the defense of the “true” tradition of Western civilization was formulated not as the fault of a people, but of an ideology. The enemies had names associated with political worldviews: fascists, communists, Nazis, radicals, anarchists and — why not? — even the more generally mild-mannered socialists (guilty not of being hard and terrible, but of being “collectivist,” a severe moral failing based on their supposed ignorance of hard economic reality).

In his 2000 presidential campaign, George W Bush the fact that, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, there was no apparent ideological enemy to motivate us to warlike heroism.

“When I was coming up, it was a dangerous world, and you knew exactly who they were. It was Us v. Them, and it was clear who ‘Them’ was. Today, we are not so sure who the ‘They’ are, but we know they’re there.”

It didn’t take him long, once he was in office, to identify “Them” as an undefined population that could be summed up in a single word “terror,” against whom all decent, civilized people must commit to wage war. The new enemy happened to have a religious identity — Muslim — but Bush quickly reassured us that, even though it was a crusade, it wasn’t about theology. It was about uncivilized behavior conducted by people whose minds were contaminated by a misperception of reality. They “hate us for our freedoms” Bush . They simply happened to be Muslim and were deemed to have a taste for hoarding weapons of mass destruction (until we found out there were none). He took the trouble to make an important : “The face of terror is not the true faith of Islam… Islam is peace. These terrorists don’t represent peace. They represent evil and war.”

See no evil, or see evil everywhere?

As noted above, the War on Terror ran out of ideological steam about the time we could no longer decide whether Al Qaeda was with us or against us. Biden, Sullivan’s new boss, following Trump’s loss of the 2020 election, redefined Bush’s “Them” as “the autocrats” vs. us, “the democrats.” That enabled him to leave the question of ideology and Islamist terror behind him and focus not on ideas but on real evil-doers, such as Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping. That correlated with a new way of seeing the world: a Hollywood way. It created the expectation that if you could take out the evil leader, you could eliminate evil itself.

What better indicator of that successful transition than the fact that it was under Biden that the Syrian question was finally resolved by taking out the clearly evil dictator Bashar al-Assad? And they accomplished this by supporting and celebrating a new president, Ahmed al-Charaa, a man who had distinguished himself as a heroic former leader of both Al Qaeda and ISIS.

So where do we go from here? Most people until this epic year of 2026 had acquired the habit of thinking that wars of religion are a thing of the distant past. By the time the 18th century rolled around, we were already used to wars between nation states instead of religious denominations. In the 20th century, wars could be safely conducted between ideological adversaries.

Now we are at a new turning point. Trump, the peace president, sees an interest in making war great again by returning to the earlier paradigm of wars of religion. He has done so by teaming up with Israel and mobilizing an army led by selected generals familiar with the prophecies of the New Testament’s hallucinatory Book of Revelation. And he has set his sights on taking down the apostate theocratic regime that since 1979 has controlled the territory of ancient Persia. Trump has offered the world (centered on the Strait of Hormuz) an authentic latter-day religious war, something Europeans and Westerners in general haven’t seen since the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648.

This time, it’s the real thing. A Jewish theocracy teams up with a powerful, officially secular nation that has nevertheless thought of itself since its very beginnings in 1620 as the . They have pooled their resources to attack a rigorous Shiite Muslim theocracy. Things couldn’t be clearer, even on the US side, despite its e pluribus unum mantra. When things get rough and swords are drawn, the unum (one) triumphs over the pluribus (many).

Throughout his political career, the secular but nominally Roman Catholic Biden consistently himself a Zionist. During his presidency, he proved it by generously providing the wherewithal for Israel to wage its genocidal campaign designed to depopulate the Palestinian community. But Biden could only go so far. Unlike Trump, Sleepy Joe had lost the connection with the wide awake (but clearly not woke) people who really mattered: Christian Zionists.

That connection has now been reestablished with brio. Trump holds all the reins and knows how to pull in one direction or another, with no need for assistance except from Heaven itself (apparently embedded in his brain). No need to consult Congress or convoke the United Nations Security Council. Why even think of informing his NATO allies, who could potentially be directly concerned? Trump has the moral stature that has plugged him directly into what Americans like to call the , a controversial and ahistorical concept if ever there was one, but always serviceable in times of conflict. He has magisterially plugged himself into that tradition by launching what historians are likely to call the first genuinely Judeo-Christian Zionist war.

In the spectacular, unprovoked assault called Operation Epic Fury, Trump’s recently rechristened Department of War under Head Warrior Pete Hegseth achieved its initial goal of Operation Epic Fury with exceptional prowess by simultaneously taking out Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and 165 dangerous schoolgirls. An uncontested success certain to provoke jealousy among the weak-minded.

Some have mockingly referred to it as “Operation Epstein Fury.” They do so on two grounds. The US–Israel tandem, a kind of “coalition of the willing to conduct blackmail when needed to stabilize things” brings together people with bold ideas and few inhibitions, including Trump himself, who have at various times shared “good times” with pedophile Jeffrey Epstein himself. And a this week shows a majority of Americans entertain the idea that Trump launched the war to push the Epstein files out of the news headlines.   

Of course, referring to the campaign as Operation Epstein Fury — which seems to me a pretty appropriate and effective joke — has been predictably qualified as antisemitic. The Washington Post published an calling the joke an act of “conspiratorial rebranding.” The Post’s journalists clearly expect us to agree with the proposition advanced by the Anti-Defamation League that conspiratorial actions are evil and ipso facto the work of the devil.

Speaking of branding people, ideas or nations as evil, this Devil’s Advocate happened upon a Substack with the title, “Iran as ‘the evil one,’” by former Herald Tribune journalist Patrick Lawrence. He reminds us of what most Americans should be thinking about in the weeks following the launch of a new US war: “Not for the first time, America does not know what it is doing or why it set out to do it.” A bit like Eve in the Garden of Eden, who didn’t realize what was going on but followed the advice of the evil serpent. We’ve seen the same scenario play out, with interesting variations, in Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria and elsewhere. The usual assessment has been that these lengthy and fruitless campaigns made perfect sense at the outset — evil must always be combated, it’s the nation’s moral duty — but over time they all turned out to be badly planned or their aftermath poorly executed.

This time, however, all will be well. The Christian Zionists are sure of that because everything lines up with what the Apostle John so clearly laid out in the Book of Revelation, announcing the Second Coming of Jesus. One US commander has been quoted as to his troops that “President Trump has been anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth.” The soldiers immediately consulted their manuals on lighting a signal fire.

A somewhat more level-headed man, William Butler Yeats, alas with no military training, had a different take on the Second Coming in a poem he published in 1919. The great Irish poet described the state of humanity in the leadup to the Second Coming:

“The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity.”

Living in our aging and some say declining Western world — specifically here in Europe — I tend to agree with Yeats. I see the first line as accurately describing our European leaders. The second line even more aptly portrays Trump, his intimates in the Oval Office and Hegseth’s War Department on the other side of the Atlantic.

*[The Devil’s Advocate pursues the tradition 51�Թ� began in 2017 with the launch of our “Devil’s Dictionary.” It does so with a slight change of focus, moving from language itself — political and journalistic rhetoric — to the substantial issues in the news. Read more of the 51�Թ� Devil’s Dictionary. The news we consume deserves to be seen from an outsider’s point of view. And who could be more outside official discourse than Old Nick himself?]

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51�Թ�’s Video Producer Rohan Khattar Singh speaks with Stephen Zunes, professor of politics and director of Middle Eastern Studies at the University of San Francisco. As the United States positions nearly 600 fighter jets, two carrier strike groups and dozens of warships around Iran, the conversation explores whether Washington is preparing for war.

Khattar Singh asks the central question: Can the US carry out a limited strike on Iran, or would escalation be inevitable? Zunes analyzes the legality of military action, the internal dynamics of Iranian politics and the wider geopolitical risks if conflict spreads across the Middle East.

The limits of “limited strikes”

US President Donald Trump suggested that Washington could launch “limited strikes” against Iran. Zunes argues that such action would violate international law and potentially the US Constitution if undertaken without congressional authorization.

More importantly, he doubts the premise that any conflict could remain contained. Iran possesses multiple ways to retaliate, including attacks on US bases across the region or disruptions to maritime traffic. The Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly a fifth of global oil flows, is particularly vulnerable.

Zunes warns that history rarely supports the idea of neatly bounded conflicts. As he puts it, even if Washington intends a small operation, there is a very high chance of it “getting totally out of hand.” Regional militias aligned with Iran could also target American forces, expanding the battlefield beyond the initial strike.

The massive US military buildup itself signals to Zunes that Washington may be preparing for more than coercive diplomacy.

Maximum pressure without diplomacy

Khattar Singh highlights the contradiction in US policy: Trump withdrew from the 2015 nuclear agreement in 2018 but now demands new concessions from Iran’s capital of Tehran. Zunes argues that the “maximum pressure” campaign leaves Iran with little incentive to negotiate.

Effective diplomacy, he says, requires a credible exchange. Sanctions relief was central to the earlier agreement, but Washington has indicated that sanctions might remain even if Iran complied with new demands.

Zunes also challenges the idea that nuclear proliferation or democracy promotion is the primary US concern. He believes the deeper issue is geopolitical alignment. Iran remains one of the few regional powers that refuses to accept US strategic dominance in the Middle East.

This broader contest for influence, he argues, shapes Washington’s confrontational approach.

Nationalism and the rally effect

Could military pressure weaken the Iranian regime? Zunes believes the opposite is more likely.

Iran’s political leadership is unpopular among many citizens, and the country has experienced waves of protest in recent years. Yet Iranian society also possesses a strong sense of national identity rooted in thousands of years of history.

Many Iranians who oppose the regime still reject foreign military intervention. In such circumstances, external attacks often strengthen rather than weaken governments. “People tend to rally around the flag if they’re being attacked,” Zunes explains.

He compares the situation to NATO’s bombing of Serbia in the 1990s, which was opposed by the student leaders in the anti-Milosevic struggle because it strengthened Serbian nationalism. Though the pro-democracy movement eventually won, they recognized that it set back their efforts. For Zunes, this dynamic undermines the idea that bombing Iran could trigger regime change.

Internal weakness, structural resilience

Khattar Singh asks whether Iran’s government is now at its weakest point after years of economic pressure and protest. Zunes acknowledges that the regime faces declining legitimacy and widespread dissatisfaction.

Recent demonstrations have drawn support from social groups traditionally aligned with the state, including merchants in Iran’s historic bazaars. This broader coalition reflects deep frustration with corruption, economic mismanagement and authoritarian rule.

Yet Zunes cautions that regime change is far from imminent. Iran’s political system is complex and oligarchical, not centered on a single ruler. Power is distributed among clerical authorities, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, elected institutions and competing factions.

That structure, he argues, makes the system harder to topple than more centralized dictatorships.

Nuclear logic and global consequences

Khattar Singh and Zunes conclude by examining Iran’s nuclear program and the reactions of other global powers.

Zunes suggests that military pressure could actually accelerate Tehran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons. Observing the contrasting fates of Iraq and North Korea, Iranian leaders may conclude that nuclear deterrence offers the only reliable protection against invasion.

At the regional level, Gulf Arab states and Turkey appear wary of war. Although they rival Iran strategically, they fear the economic and security consequences of a wider conflict.

China and Russia, meanwhile, are unlikely to intervene militarily. However, Zunes argues that a unilateral US attack would reinforce their belief that Washington disregards international law. “It will just underscore their concern that the United States is a rogue superpower,” he says.

For Zunes, the ultimate danger is precedent. If major powers openly violate international norms, others may follow. In that scenario, a conflict with Iran would not remain a regional crisis but could reshape global geopolitics.

Ultimately, the US and Israel would launch a missile strike on Iran on February 28, triggering the 2026 Iran war.

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Alongside early-harvest and launch tracks with the , and the Eurasian Economic Union (), plus a revived Early Progress Trade Agreement () with Canada, a clear picture of India’s new trade architecture is emerging. New Delhi is building high-quality, rules-based bilateral arrangements, phased where necessary, with partners that complement, rather than compete with, India’s strengths and priorities.

A pragmatic partnership with New Zealand

On one level, the India-New Zealand FTA is a straightforward extension of this — a pragmatic deal between two economies whose bilateral trade, while steadily growing, currently stands at a minuscule , thus leaving plenty of potential to unlock. On the other hand, it tells us something broader about where India is headed and how it intends to build prosperity, with people, not just products, at the center.

For decades, commentators have reduced India’s trade strategy to a binary: open the gates and risk import surges or stay cautious and forgo the scale and opportunity that the global economic order offers. That false choice collapsed when India refused to join the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (), and instead rewired its negotiating posture around complementarity.

This shift in strategy has been made possible by a wave of internal reforms that reached a new peak in 2025. Major changes, most notably the rollout of Goods and Services Tax this year, alongside other key reforms under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s tenure, including the simplification of foreign direct investment () norms, expanded production-linked incentive () schemes, digital governance and the implementation of the Labor Codes, have all contributed to investor confidence.

It is this transformed, future-ready India that now approaches trade negotiations from a position of strength. New Zealand fits that map. It is a high-income, rules-based economy that doesn’t compete head-to-head with India in mass manufacturing; instead, it welcomes Indian services, talent and consumer goods under transparent and fair terms.

Tariff liberalization, sectoral protections and prioritizing people 

Those terms are striking. New Zealand has granted access to all Indian exports. Not “most,” not “nearly all” — all. For India’s labor-intensive sectors — textiles and apparel, leather and footwear, gems and jewelry, marine products, toys, handicrafts — this is a once-in-a-generation opening; the kind you build upon to broaden value chains. Small exporters who dreaded duties and nickel-and-diming at the border can now quote with confidence, contract with certainty, ship with speed and expand their operations thanks to cash flows freed from tariffs.

India, for its part, has offered tariff liberalization on about of tariff lines, covering of bilateral trade value. This has been done through a calibrated blend of immediate cuts (sheep meat, wool, coal, most forestry and wood), phased reductions (oils, select machinery, wine) and carefully managed tariff-rate quotas for a handful of sensitive horticulture lines (honey, apples, kiwifruit).

But these concessions have been meticulously crafted to ensure that India’s most sensitive sectors remain protected. Dairy is the most prominent ; it is entirely ring-fenced. The shield extends further: animal products (other than sheep meat), key vegetables, sugar, some oils and strategic nonagricultural sectors such as gems and jewelry, copper and aluminum are all from tariff concessions.

This is an unmistakable signal that India will write modern, liberal trade rules, but it will do so while securing farmer incomes, Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) resilience, and food security. This is not protectionism; it is democratic prioritization for a country where agriculture is a livelihood for and not just another sector to be casually bartered away.

The agreement’s spine, however, is not goods but rather services and mobility. New Zealand’s services commitments are its most ambitious to date, Indian firms broad access across IT and IT-enabled services, professional and business services, education, finance, tourism and construction.

Crucially, the agreement includes a Most-Favored-Nation () clause: if New Zealand offers better terms to another partner in the future, India automatically receives the same benefits. For India’s already globally competitive services sector, this means new opportunities to establish a presence in Oceania, recruit local talent and scale operations in a stable, rules-based environment.

But the real innovation is the Temporary Employment Entry Visa, a for up to 5,000 Indian professionals at any given time to live and work in New Zealand for up to three years, targeted at skill shortages (IT, engineering, healthcare, education, construction) and specialty roles (yoga instructors, Indian chefs, music teachers). Paired with the fact that the removes numerical caps on Indian students, guarantees 20 hours/week of work during study, and extends post-study work to 3 years for science, technology, engineering and mathematics graduates and 4 years for doctorates, as well as a 1,000-place Working Holiday scheme, and you’ve stitched the “living bridge” of a 300,000-strong Indian diaspora into the economic fabric.

Critics — some inside New Zealand’s politics — have that these mobility channels “give too much away.” That is an entirely incorrect framing, though. Global trade today is not a container-ship contest; it is a talent distribution contest. When shortages hobble , and sites, partnering with a country that supplies trained professionals under transparent, targeted and time-bound rules is not a concession for New Zealand; it is capacity building.

For India, talent mobility is not brain drain but instead brain circulation. Earnings, networks and know-how will eventually come home, while remittances in the interim can help stabilize families. Far from “giving away” jobs, this agreement allows New Zealand to fill gaps that its own workforce cannot meet. At the same time, the pathways it opens enable Indian professionals to gain global experience and return with skills that strengthen India’s economy — further enhancing India’s international reputation as a source of reliable, high-quality talent.

Implementation and future prospects

The FTA also does the dull yet decisive things right. Customs modernization commits India to release windows at the border. That single clause can save exporters more money than many tariff cuts, because time itself can act as a shadow tariff. The pact hardwires cooperation on and rules and creates Agri-Technology for kiwifruit, apples and honey. These plans mean both countries will collaborate on sharing best practices — needless to say, India will be the beneficiary.

Additionally, the agreement requires New Zealand to update its Geographical Indications () framework, thereby granting India the same rights as the EU to register wines, spirits and other goods, ensuring full parity in GI protection. Regulatory access for pharmaceuticals, medical devices and organic products has also been streamlined, reducing duplication and accelerating approvals.

There is also long-term capital behind this agreement: New Zealand has $ 20 billion in investment in India over the next 15 years. The scale of this commitment signals confidence in India’s economic trajectory and its potential as a global growth engine. The agreement also includes a rebalancing that allows India to take remedial measures if the delivery of investments falls short of its commitments. India has learned that FTAs without real capital and capability often disappoint; this one addresses both, the kind of long-term backbone that many earlier agreements lacked.

Of course, no agreement is without its challenges. The FTA will require careful implementation and timely ratification, efficient visa processing, and real delivery on its various Agri-tech and customs commitments.

But from an Indian perspective, the fundamentals are solid: the deal is structured to maximize opportunity while safeguarding core interests. It is precisely the template India should look to replicate — combining asymmetric access to goods that favors MSMEs with ambitious services and talent mobility. It is bilateralism that looks beyond tariffs, focusing instead on people, productivity and a true sense of partnership.

India’s new trade architecture is not merely about opening doors but about building bridges among economies, nations and, above all, people. In that vein, the India-New Zealand FTA is a blueprint for how the next decade of Indian trade can and should be built.

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This is not a new story. The foundations of ���Dz��Ծ���’s military industry were laid during socialist Yugoslavia, when more than half of the Yugoslav People’s Army’s arms and ammunition were produced in what is today Bosnia and Herzegovina. Facilities established between 1948 and 1951 were concentrated in the republic, reflecting both geography and the federation’s emphasis on industrial depth and redundancy. Although the wars of the 1990s severely damaged this infrastructure, they did not erase the skilled workforce, institutional knowledge or manufacturing culture on which the sector was built.

Revitalization of ���Dz��Ծ���’s defense industry

Over the past decade,���Dz��Ծ���’s has undergone a steady, largely overlooked revival. The sector today employs several thousand workers across more than 20 companies, spanning state-owned incumbents, mixed-ownership firms and a growing private segment. Producers such as Pretis Vogošća, BNT Novi Travnik and Binas Bugojno have scaled up the output of high-demand munitions, particularly 155 millimeter artillery shells. BNT alone has potential annual production capacity in the hundreds of thousands of rounds — figures that, if sustained, place Bosnia among the more consequential secondary producers on Europe’s periphery.

The industry is almost entirely export-oriented. More than 80% of ���Dz��Ծ���’s arms and ammunition output is sold abroad, reaching over 40 countries. In the first two months of 2025, Bosnia and Herzegovina military equipment worth €46.6 million — double the value for the same period in 2024. Likewise, total military exports in 2025 reached around 400 million Bosnia-Herzegovina Convertible Mark (€200 million), up 100 million Bosnia-Herzegovina Convertible Mark from 2023.

Early 2026 trends suggest export values could significantly exceed previous years. While the country does not produce complex, high-end systems, its specialty in bombs, grenades, mines, rockets, ammunition and related components has made it increasingly relevant in conflicts where consumables are in high demand.

���Dz��Ծ���’s dual role in defense and geopolitics

���Dz��Ծ���’s renewed relevance is also geopolitical. The country sits at a strategic crossroads between its Euro-Atlantic aspirations and persistent Russian influence in parts of its political system. While not a NATO member, Bosnia is a partner country and an to Ukraine’s war effort. Its defense industry occupies a distinctive niche: few European producers retain the technical capacity to manufacture both NATO-standard and Soviet-caliber arms and ammunition at scale. This dual compatibility has allowed Bosnian firms to serve a diverse customer base spanning NATO states, the Middle East, Africa and other markets — while remaining adaptable to shifting battlefield requirements.

This strategic utility has not gone unnoticed by the US. US firms have emerged as some of the largest buyers of Bosnian ammunition, quietly but firmly embedding the country in Western supply chains. While Bosnia does not officially export arms to Ukraine, deliveries are routed through intermediaries, allowing its factories to contribute materially while navigating domestic political sensitivities. US investment has been central to this process: is one example.

The US-based defense company purchased majority stakes in two Bosnian armaments companies, Pretis and Binas. With a $100 million capital injection into Sarajevo’s Pretis factory, the company has already brought forward upgrades it couldn’t have afforded on its own. Joe Wallis, the company’s CEO,:

To be honest, we didn’t come to BiH because it was the easiest place to operate. We came because it made sense; strategically and personally. What we found here was a depth of expertise, real industrial capability, and a work ethic that frankly impressed us. These are qualities you can’t fake, especially in sectors where precision and trust are non-negotiable. This wasn’t a fly-in, sign-a-deal kind of situation. We spent time here. We met the people, walked the floors, and looked at the long-term. And what we saw was a country that deserves investment, not just interest. That’s what brought Regulus here—and what’s keeping us here.

Emerging defense industries in the Western Balkans: a strategic asset for Europe

The broader Western Balkans also stand poised to contribute to Europe’s defense-industrial resurgence. According to a by Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, Albania is reviving production of explosives, small arms, ammunition and drones, while entering a joint venture with the UK for armored vehicles. Kosovo and North Macedonia are with Turkish firms to develop ammunition and propellant capabilities and to seed domestic drone ecosystems. Cost competitiveness and proximity to European markets are clear advantages: output can be priced below Western equivalents and delivered rapidly. With predictable demand signals and modest investment, these facilities could help plug bottlenecks in EU and NATO supply chains.

This industrial and regional relevance aligns closely with Europe’s own strategic ambitions. The European Commission’s 2025 White Paper on European Defence, , identifies concrete industrial priorities, four of which map directly onto Western Balkan strengths.

First, Europe aims to produce at least two million large-caliber artillery rounds annually, creating immediate demand for existing production lines in Bosnia and neighboring states. Second, investment in artillery systems themselves opens space for licensing, modernization and scaling production from proven regional manufacturers. Third, drones and counterdrone systems — while high-end unmanned aerial vehicles remain the domain of larger original equipment manufacturers — offer opportunities for cost-effective intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, as well as for loitering platforms. Fourth, expanding capacities for propellants, explosives and munitions aligns with both EU supply needs and ���Dz��Ծ���’s demonstrated export strengths.

Here is where Ukraine comes into the picture. Politically, the Western Balkans have largely condemned Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Several countries in the region have also providedtangible : Albania donated Mine-resistant ambush protected vehicles along with small-arms and mortar ammunition, Montenegro contributed naval and artillery munitions, Kosovo supplied vehicles, ammunition packages and hosted training activities, while Serbia — though publicly avoiding direct military aid — has been widely reported to have supplied substantial ammunition via third parties, with open-source estimates reaching up to €800 million by the end of 2024. Bosnia itself has channeled significant volumes of ammunition to Ukraine through intermediaries. Taken together, these contributions represent niche but nontrivial support streams, particularly valuable during the early phases of the conflict when Soviet-standard systems were at a premium.

Bosnian American political analyst sees a lot of potential in Bosnia supplying Ukraine’s military: 

But for the purposes of the question of Ukraine’s needs at this time, all of the relevant firms are located in the Federation entity. And these are firms that produce munitions and specifically large caliber artillery munitions, in particular 155mm shells, the NATO standard artillery caliber. You have at least two firms that are producing the shells sort of tutto completo, and then another two firms that are producing various components for these shells. You also have another company there, Igman, which does not produce artillery shells, but is producing large quantities of small arms munitions. 

Overall, the Bosnian defense industry is valued at several hundred million dollars — potentially even a billion, depending on valuation — an impressive scale for a country of its size.

Bosnia is not about to become Europe’s arsenal. But in an era defined by attrition warfare, logistical pressure and the need for resilient industrial throughput, secondary producers matter more than ever. ���Dz��Ծ���’s defense industry has demonstrated the ability to meet NATO standards, scale output and absorb targeted investment. What it has lacked until now is sustained strategic attention. If the trajectory of US engagement, EU interest and regional industrial expansion continues, ���Dz��Ծ���’s quiet rearmament may emerge as one of Europe’s most consequential, if least noticed, security stories.

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The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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But how, exactly, are human rights addressed on the global stage? How does the UN set the tone, push boundaries and move the international consensus forward? The answer to these questions lies in the institution’s and its member states’ tremendous propensity to be extremely cautious. This quality explains not only how the UN functions but also why its progress on human rights is so often slower than we’d like. Finding a way to both navigate and overcome this issue may enable the UN to raise the bar moving forward. 

Caution over ambition

Anyone who observes the UN will quickly notice that caution, rather than ambition, is one of the most clear-cut themes in its culture. The UN Human Rights is the central UN body tasked exclusively with addressing human rights issues. Yet much of its work centers on maintaining the status quo: reintroducing the same thematic and country-specific resolutions, year after year, often with only minor updates to the text.

For instance, the EU’s on freedom of religion or belief has been introduced and adopted by consensus every year since 2010. In the beginning, each year extended the resolution’s scope, but over time, the added value of adopting the text annually became limited to political reaffirmation, continuation of core projects and signaling ongoing relevance. While introducing a resolution on the same topic every year or two helps to signal continued attention, track developments and reaffirm the issue’s relevance in an evolving context, excessive repetition of the Council’s resolutions diverts its attention from addressing new issues and extending the scope of human rights in more innovative ways.

States generally avoid introducing resolutions that are likely to be rejected — even when doing so might serve to highlight urgent violations or test the Council’s resolve. Failed resolutions are rare, and that rarity is no accident. The reputational cost of proposing a draft that fails to pass is high. As a result, states prefer to recycle what is already known to work rather than push for progress that might prove politically divisive.

Hidden progress

This risk-averse logic does not spare even the most norm-driven actors. The EU, widely regarded as a champion of multilateralism and human rights, also operates within this cautious framework. In recent years, the EU introduced only a few new resolution topics such as the and protection of human rights in the context of climate change, the rights of child and family , human rights of women and girls in , and the human rights situation in . Most resolutions introduced on behalf of the EU were not designed to break new ground but to renew existing mandates or reaffirm previously established standards by avoiding unfriendly amendments and securing consensus. 

These efforts should not be taken for granted; maintaining the resolution is also an active contribution to human rights standards. For instance, the EU’s to reintroduce its resolution on human rights violations in Ethiopia in 2023 did not go unnoticed and marked a significant failure in the consistent international response to well-reported atrocities. At the same time, it is evident that a strategy based on reinforcing the existing resolutions alone does not push the bar for human rights standards much higher. 

The missing champion

The UN’s ability to push the limits of its caution and ambivalence is chiefly prevented by the lack of any clear member-state champion of ambitious norm-setting in today’s human rights diplomacy. The EU could be a natural candidate, but its hands are . Its internal coordination process, which requires unanimity among 27 member states, naturally leads to lowest-common-denominator outcomes. This limits its ability to champion the rights of sexual minorities and stand against polarizing genocides. Moreover, the EU tends to avoid transactional diplomacy, even when its global partners do not. This can significantly limit its negotiation power in a world where issue linkage across political and economic matters is an increasingly common bargaining strategy.

Other powers, such as China, approach the Council differently. Despite often holding conflicting views on human rights, especially on issues such as individual freedoms and minority protections, China does not hesitate to use its economic and political leverage to gain support for its positions. It links issues strategically and mobilizes regional blocs to shape votes in its favour. The EU, by contrast, refrains from such tactics in principle, which limits its influence in an increasingly competitive multilateral environment.

Raising the bar for human rights at the UN requires the emergence of a champion willing to face significant political and procedural challenges. Introducing new or more progressive human rights standards entails a high risk of failure, especially in a system where consensus is valued over confrontation. The failure of a resolution can result in reputational costs, including the perception of weakened credibility and diminished influence in future negotiations. Moreover, a champion must be able to mobilize sufficient support in an increasingly fragmented international environment. 

In the context of growing polarization and transactional diplomacy, this often requires building leverage across multiple policy areas, which may require controversial strategies such as issue linkage. Without sufficient bargaining power, even well-drafted and morally justified proposals risk being amended beyond recognition, postponed or rejected. Therefore, any attempt to raise the bar will inevitably require a departure from the cautious modus operandi that currently characterizes the functioning of the multilateral human rights debate.

If the Human Rights Council is to move beyond ritual reaffirmation, it needs actors willing to spend political capital on pushing the boundaries of what is possible. Progress will come not from consensus maintenance alone, but from the rare champions prepared to navigate fragmentation, confront transactional diplomacy and risk reputational setbacks in order to raise the global standard for human rights.

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A party enforcer at the helm

Apart from other high-profile roles serving the CCP in multilateral institutions, Zou as Deputy Secretary-General of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (), one of the CCP’s core instruments for enforcing ideological discipline and manufacturing consent. Despite its benign-sounding name, the CPPCC is not a debating society or a pluralistic forum. It exists to align elites, interest groups and public opinion with party doctrine, ensuring that major policy decisions are not merely implemented but legitimized. Its role is coordination and control, not consultation in any Western sense. In short, she is an enforcer, just like her predecessor for a decade, Jin Liqun.

That pedigree matters because leadership in a multilateral development bank is not just about capital allocation or project appraisal; it is about institutional direction, norms and credibility. A president steeped in party discipline is not likely to treat the AIIB as an independent lender guided by developmental additionality, transparency and borrower need. She will undoubtedly use it as a strategic instrument — just as her predecessor did — one more lever in Beijing’s expanding toolkit of economic and political statecraft.

Deepening alignment with China’s Belt and Road Initiative

Under Zou, the AIIB can be expected to continue, and likely deepen, its alignment, since its inception, with China’s Belt and Road Initiative (). The creation of both was hatched by the CCP at exactly the same time in 2013. Despite repeated assurances from management that the AIIB is distinct from BRI, the practical overlap has long been evident: shared corridors, synergistic priorities and cofinanced projects that advance China’s geopolitical reach while diffusing financial and reputational risk. The AIIB offers Beijing something the BRI alone cannot: a multilateral veneer that softens political resistance and draws in the capital and legitimacy of advanced democracies. That is why countries like the US and Japan chose not to join.

In this sense, Zou is the perfect candidate. Like Jin, she combines international polish with unwavering loyalty to the party line. The continuity is not accidental. The CCP does not leave strategically important institutions to chance, especially those that intersect with global finance, infrastructure and influence. Leadership succession at the AIIB has followed the logic of absolute loyalty to the Party.

The complicity of non-Chinese shareholders

What is equally troubling is the acquiescence of AIIB’s non-Chinese shareholders. Countries such as Australia, the UK and India , their taxpayers underwriting projects that often advance China’s strategic objectives more than their own national interests. This persistence reflects a combination of foreign influence, elite capture and bureaucratic inertia: once inside the tent, exit becomes politically awkward, diplomatically uncomfortable and institutionally resisted. 

Canada is even considering rejoining the AIIB after concerns were first raised by the Bank’s former head of Communications, Bob Pickard (a Canadian), in 2023 about a subterranean management cabal run by the CCP within the Bank, resulting in a “toxic culture.” Canada took the allegations very seriously and with the Bank then, but this week, Prime Minister Mark Carney was essentially kissing the ring while visiting Beijing.

The justification offered is familiar. Staying in allows these countries to “shape from within,” to promote high standards and to prevent the Bank from becoming a purely Chinese instrument. Yet years of experience suggest that this influence is marginal at best. Governance remains heavily weighted toward Beijing. Strategic direction tracks Chinese priorities. And leadership selection — arguably the clearest signal of institutional “independence” — has remained firmly under Chinese control.

Meanwhile, participation carries real costs. Membership lends credibility to projects that may undermine debt sustainability, distort regional power balances or crowd out genuinely independent development finance. It normalizes a model in which multilateral institutions are repurposed to serve the geopolitical goals of their dominant shareholder, eroding the very norms that postwar development banks were designed to uphold. The AIIB is not the only guilty party among the multilaterals, of course, many of which are similarly highly politicized and experience oversized influence from their leadership overlords. What distinguishes them is that the CCP is not a benevolent force in the world — it is malignant.

Zou’s appointment should therefore be read not as a routine personnel decision, but as a strategic inflection point. It confirms that the AIIB is entering a phase of tighter political alignment with Beijing at a time when China’s external posture is becoming more assertive, not less. For democracies that continue to participate, the question is no longer whether the Bank might drift toward serving Chinese interests. That drift occurred from its inception. The question is whether their continued involvement makes them complicit — and it does.

Multilateral legitimacy captured

Multilateralism only works when institutions are more than instruments of the powerful. When leadership is drawn directly from a ruling party’s ideological enforcement apparatus, claims of neutrality ring hollow. The AIIB under Zou Jiayi is unlikely to surprise anyone who has been paying attention. It will be efficient, disciplined and outwardly cooperative — while quietly reinforcing the expansionary objectives of the state that controls it.

At some point, member countries will have to decide whether symbolic influence is worth substantive compromise. If the answer remains yes, Beijing will have learned an important lesson: multilateral legitimacy, once captured, is remarkably easy to keep.

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The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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Enemy of the Sun’s story

Ghareeb traces the book’s origins to 1969, when he was a student at Georgetown University in Washington, DC, and traveled to the Middle East. There, he interviewed Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) chairman Yasser Arafat in Jordan — an encounter that unexpectedly drew wide attention. The night before he left, he attended a poetry reading featuring Palestinian poets who are “still in the green line in Israel,” some recently released from prison. Struck by what he heard, he returned to the United States and began translating poems by poets Samih al-Qasim, Mahmoud Darwish and others for student newspapers.

A month later, he connected with Naseer Aruri, an American human rights activist and professor of Middle Eastern politics. He was also translating Palestinian poetry, so the two collaborated to assemble a manuscript. This was then rejected by 13 publishers. The social justice-focused Beacon Press briefly showed interest before backing out, telling Ghareeb that their orders came from the higher-ups.

The breakthrough came through Drum and Spear Press, an Afro-diasporic publishing house founded by activists from the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. At first, they refused, saying: “We only publish things about Africa and African Americans.” Ghareeb, however, convinced them that Palestinians and African Americans shared struggles of dispossession, apartheid and second-class citizenship. Five weeks later, Drum and Spear Press accepted the manuscript and printed ten thousand copies. They sold out, making the book a bestseller.

The book’s title came from a poem by al-Qasim, whom Ghareeb describes as vibrant, leftist and open-minded. The poem’s defiance — its refusal to be eclipsed — became a symbol of the collection itself.

Translating Palestinian poetry

For Ghareeb, Palestinian poetry is inseparable from history. Its emergence is linked to the 1948 Nakba — the Palestinian displacement that occurred with the creation of the state of Israel. Poets wrote to express frustration, anger, love and calls for “brotherhood and equality.” They wrote in the shadow of loss, but also in the rhythms of classical Arabic traditions where poets were guardians of honor, critics of power and voices of the tribe.

Lebanese, Syrian and Egyptian counterparts overshadowed Palestinian poets. Yet they were shaped by the same renaissance currents — the 19th-century Nahda, which saw the revival of Arabic literature — and by the writers of the Mahjar literary movement, such as Kahlil Gibran, Mikhail Naimy and Ameen Rihani, who connected Arab literary life to the West. Their poetry traveled far beyond Palestine, crossing borders the poets themselves could not.

The book’s rediscovery came through another act of translation — not between languages, but between struggles. A professor researching Palestinian–Africana connections found that George Jackson, the Black Panther Party leader killed in prison, had copied two poems from Enemy of the Sun in his own hand. Black newspapers published them, mistakenly attributing them to Jackson.

This misunderstanding revealed something larger: a sense of kinship between oppressed peoples who recognized themselves in one another’s words. As Ghareeb puts it, it shows “how close their struggles were, that there were a lot of similarities.”

Socialism in Palestine

Singh observes that modern audiences often associate Palestinian politics with the Sunni Palestinian nationalist group, Hamas. Both Singh and Ghareeb remind listeners that the Palestinian movement was once deeply socialist and ecumenical. From Gamal Abdel Nasser in Egypt to the Ba’th Party in Syria and Iraq, Arab nationalism and socialism defined the political landscape. The PLO itself was born in that tradition. Many of its most influential intellectuals, such as Palestinian and American academic Edward Said and Palestinian politician Hanan Ashrawi, were Christian.

This openness extended beyond religion. Early Palestinian leftists worked alongside Jewish socialists and admired anti-imperialist movements abroad. One of the book’s poets, Rashid Hussein, was married to a Jewish Israeli woman. Others wrote poems about Vietnam, African Americans and Indigenous Americans. They had true solidarity.

Palestinian poetry of the era embraced Muslim, Christian and Jewish imagery alike. Darwish could write about Jesus Christ, while another poet could imagine the trials of Job. This was a statement of coexistence, a reflection of the plural identities that once defined Palestinian life.

Writing for the Palestinian cause

Ghareeb says the central theme of Enemy of the Sun is the struggle for recognition. The Palestinians are a people demanding their rights, dignity and humanity be acknowledged. He notes that the Palestinians were first ignored by the British after the 1917 Balfour Declaration, then displaced by new arrivals who claimed a religious right to the land. What moved him most was human depth — the certainty that “the Palestinians are a people like anybody else,” who have suffered, endured and refused to disappear.

The collection includes women’s voices as well. The most notable of these is Fadwa Touqan, the feminist poet who used the image of a tree battered by storms yet rooted in the earth, able to rise again. Ghareeb considers that image more than a metaphor. It is a prophecy of survival.

This year, Seven Stories Press reissued the book with new poems. Its earlier copies had become expensive collector’s items, showing its lasting resonance.

In the end, Enemy of the Sun is more than a literary anthology. It is an archive of a people’s emotional history, a bridge between struggles and a challenge to enforced silence. As Singh concludes, it is “part of the human story” — and Ghareeb agrees.

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The views expressed in this article/podcast are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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