Atlantic Council

As expected, the National Front (BN) coalition won Malaysia’s May 5 election, but not without widespread allegations of electoral fraud, including the use of Bangladeshi migrants as illegal voters and other gerrymandering tactics. The opposition People’s Pact (PR) coalition leader Anwar Ibrahim refused to concede defeat and held a protest rally on May 8, attended by about 100,000.

Here at a conference on Professional Military Education, attention is being focused on one small sliver of the largest challenge facing militaries in general and Western forces in particular: People.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip ErdoÄŸan comes to Washington at a time of domestic crisis over car bombings at Reyhanlı on the Syrian border that killed over 50 and resulted in hundreds of wounded, many seriously. The Turkish public, which has never supported Ankara’s tough line on President Bashar al-Assad, is alarmed.

"If the United States and Europe are to remain competitive—economically, politically, and strategically—in this increasingly multipolar world, they must reach out to partners who share their values and can contribute to a stronger transatlantic economy. That partner is Latin America."

From his 75 percent income tax to his 25 percent approval ratings, François Hollande, the French president who took office one year ago, has already been judged the hapless Louis XVI on the eve of the French Revolution or the feckless René Coty who presided over the demise of the Fourth Republic. But what has caused Hollande to adopt the stance he has?

 Occasionally a public opinion survey surfaces that signals a seismic event. That is the case with a new report from the Pew Research Center that measures the widening tremors of a political earthquake now shaking Europe.

Successful summits tend to be more about symbolism than substance.  South Korean President Park Geun-hye’s summit with US President Barack Obama certainly had its share of symbolism: the first foreign trip of the ROK’s new first woman President, 60^th anniversary of the US-ROK alliance, and US-ROK messages to North Korea, to Japan and China.

In a season of commencement speeches, those trying to impart a measure of wisdom to college grads would do well to consult President John F. Kennedy's American University speech, given 50 years ago next month.

On this anniversary of the 1940 Nazi invasion of the Low Countries it is perhaps appropriate to consider the state of Europe’s defense.

The debate about European defense tends to focus on the need to spend more and deploy more. One deceptively simple question is usually ignored: why? Americans seem to assume that more European capabilities will be deployed where it is convenient for the United States. Europeans just seek to avoid the difficult debate that it would provoke – until now.