Russia-Ukraine Conflict
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Conflicts - Tensions
Despite neutrality claims, Beijing and Moscow support Iran’s war, inflicting collateral costs on Indo-Pacific
FORUM Staff The Iran war, intensified and prolonged with support from China and Russia, is affecting innocent people worldwide, especially in South and Southeast Asia. Though Beijing and Moscow claim neutrality and purportedly call for peace, they provide the Iranian regime with surveillance and other defense-related technology, dual-use equipment, and sanctions-breaking purchases that bolster Tehran’s wartime economy and ultimately cause…
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Conflicts - Tensions
North Korea, Russia evade U.N. sanctions to buttress Moscow’s drone
FORUM Staff North Korea has sent workers to Russia to manufacture military drones, violating United Nations Security Council resolutions, an international monitoring team reported, noting the number of North Koreans working in Russia has sharply increased since Moscow’s war with Ukraine began in 2022. Overall, an estimated 100,000 North Korean laborers are deployed overseas, mostly to China and Russia, the…
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Features
Arctic Vigilance
FORUM Staff Deepening cooperation in law, scientific research and marine technology in the Arctic were highlights of a 2019 pact between China and Finland. The relationship, as it pertains to the polar region, has since cooled. The nations’ 2025-2029 Joint Action Plan does not mention the Arctic. When Finnish President Alexander Stubb visited Beijing in October 2024, mutual praise flowed…
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Features
Countering North Korea’s Asymmetric Playbook
Lt. Gen. (Ret.) In-Bum Chun/Republic of Korea Army North Korea has depended on asymmetry for more than seven decades. Economically weak, diplomatically isolated and technologically constrained, Pyongyang tries to compensate with a web of coercive tools: nuclear weapons, ballistic missiles, cyber intrusions, special operations forces (SOF), political warfare, smuggling networks, and extensive urban and subterranean defenses. These capabilities do not…
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Features
Counterattack
FORUM Staff Acceleration and affordability are key pillars of the uncrewed aerial vehicle (UAV) strategy for the United States and its Allies and Partners in the Indo-Pacific. The U.S. amplified the strategy when Secretary of War Pete Hegseth created the Joint Interagency Task Force (JIATF) 401 in August 2025 to rapidly acquire and integrate defense systems to combat small UAVs.…
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Features
Coordinated Response
Dr. Tae-Eun Song/Korea National Diplomatic Academy The numerous phases of the Russia-Ukraine conflict illustrate the value of different strategies and tactics. Prominent among the lessons learned — and one that should be of special interest to Indo-Pacific policymakers — is the importance of strategic communications and the need for a concerted response to the messaging of malign actors. When Moscow…
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Features
Triple Trouble
The spectacle was unprecedented, though rooted in false claims. Leaders of China, North Korea and Russia convened in Beijing in September 2025 to commemorate Imperial Japan’s surrender to Allied forces 80 years before, ending World War II. High-level representatives of 23 mostly developing nations joined them for a tightly choreographed military parade at Tiananmen Square. Beneath the propagandist fanfare was…
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Conflicts - Tensions
U.S. pushes for peace deal between Russia and Ukraine
FORUM Staff The United States advanced the possibility of peace talks between Russia and Ukraine in mid-August 2025 by holding separate meetings with the nations’ leaders. Analysts were cautiously optimistic that the discussions would lead to a trilateral summit to end the more than three-year conflict. U.S. President Donald Trump met for three hours with Russian President Vladimir Putin in…
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Conflicts - Tensions
Japan ‘fundamentally reinforcing’ defense capabilities, bolstering U.S. alliance
FORUM Staff Facing the “most severe and complex security environment” in 80 years — sparked largely by China’s military buildup and aggression — Japan is bolstering its air and missile defenses, expanding its uncrewed systems and strengthening its mobile deployment capabilities, while deepening critical collaboration with Allies and Partners. “The Alliance with the United States is a key pillar of…
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Conflicts - Tensions
A Breakable Bond
The first news to inform North Koreans that their countrymen were fighting — and dying — on Russian battlefields likely came from over-the-border loudspeaker broadcasts by the Republic of Korea (ROK) Armed Forces. For months, the North’s authoritarian Kim Jong Un regime maintained official silence about its deployment of soldiers to Ukraine, where an estimated 4,000 of them were killed…
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