Free Republic

Russian officials plan to outline “the contours of a new world order” over the next month as Russia and China intensify their efforts to gain influence at the United Nations. “Our idea is to hold a comprehensive, forward-looking strategic discussion about the contours of a new world order that is coming to replace the unipolar one,” Ambassador Vasily Nebenzia, the top Russian envoy at the U.N., told state media. “This conversation is long overdue.” Nebenzia will play a prominent role in stage-managing that effort, as Russia’s upcoming turn as rotating president of the U.N. Security Council will allow Moscow to...

And therein lies the beginning of what could become quite a story. It has been said that one cannot use an old map to explore a new world. Yet, if one is Communist China, one might be able to edit it to create a new world. Beijing’s recently revised mapping standards seem to suggest it is attempting just that. The standards, released by the Ministry of Natural Resources on the approval of the State Council of the people’s republic, require that all Chinese maps “accurately reflect the scope of China’s territory.” In addition to islands in the South China Sea...

Russian crude-oil exports have taken a serious hit since new sanctions and a price cap came into force earlier in the week, with the Wall Street Journal reporting that figures from two data providers on Russian crude both show a big fall, though their magnitudes differ. According to one commodity-analytics firm Kpler, Russia’s seaborne exports fell by nearly 500,000 barrels per day on Tuesday, a 16% decline from the November average of 3.08 million bpd. Meanwhile, TankerTrackers.com, which tracks sea vessels using signals and satellite images, has reported that Russia's crude exports fell by nearly 50%. With shipments from the...

For years, the Russian government has been attempting to create an 'Iron Man'-type of suit for battle. This had remained all talk, but in recent years, this world superpower has appeared to have started testing the use of exoskeletons on the battlefield with Ukraine. Even prior to recent Russian media announcements about their hope to build a superhuman exoskeleton for soldiers, giving them the ability to both carry more weapons and have more stamina, Russian powers had been rumored to have testing out a suit of armor that would make Star Wars fans nostalgic. Russian media stated that artillery forces...

The Cuban Missile Crisis is a malicious misnomer. Cuba never had any nuclear missiles; it temporarily played host to some Soviet ones. The crisis started when Americans put their intermediate-range nuclear missiles in Turkey that posed a new threat the Soviet Union, which responded by placing similar missiles in Cuba, evening the score. The Americans flew into a rage but eventually calmed down and withdrew their missiles from Turkey. The Soviets withdrew their missiles from Cuba and the crisis was over. And so it should be called the American Missile Crisis. What’s happening now couldn’t be more different. Unless you...

Ukraine’s armed forces on Wednesday downed four Russian helicopters in 18 minutes in the south of the country. Between 8.40am and 8.58am, anti-aircraft missile units of Ukraine’s Air Force managed to hit the Russian aircrafts, it was claimed. “Combat work was carried out on two more helicopters, so there is a high probability that the number of confirmed down helicopters will increase,” the Air Force said in a press release. It was claimed one Russian helicopter, believed to be a Ka-52, crashed on territory recently liberated from Russian-backed militants, while the rest crashed behind enemy lines. The helicopters were said...