Pressure Builds in Afghanistan

Pressure Builds in Afghanistan

A U.S. soldier is suspected of killing 16 Afghan civilians in a solitary shooting spree early Sunday. These attacks followed by a few weeks the killing of two U.S. officers at the hand of an Afghan soldier working in Kabul's secure Interior Ministry. Earlier still, Korans and Islamic religious materials were burned at Bagram Air Field.
Soldiers caught under the pressures of war sometimes engage in acts of stunning brutality against enemy soldiers and civilians. As anyone with a cursory knowledge of the history of war knows, some soldiers commit crimes against the very civilians they are fighting for.

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The United States as Natural Gas Exporter

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Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Men at a hydraulic fracturing site in Pennsylvania on Jan. 18

Summary

The United States has significantly increased its natural gas production since 2005, largely because of advancements in extraction technology. These technological improvements are relatively new, so their exact long-term impact on U.S. production is currently unclear. However, in the short term, this increased production has caused domestic prices to decrease substantially.

 

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Mexico's Poppy Cultivation and Heroin Production

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Analysis

Mexican heroin production has increased dramatically over the last seven years, rising from an estimated 8 metric tons in 2005 to 50 metric tons in 2009. In addition, Mexico's total area of poppy cultivation increased seven-fold from 2002 to 2009, rising from 2,700 hectares to 19,500 hectares according to the U.S. State Department. Much of this increase has been attributed to the growing prevalence of black tar heroin, a less refined opiate derivative than its better-known cousin, white heroin. Mexico's main opium-growing region is along the Sierra Madre Occidental and Sierra Madre del Sur, stretching from Chihuahua state through Sinaloa, Durango, Nayarit, Jalisco, Michoacan, Guerrero and Oaxaca states. Based on the geographic location of the poppy cultivation areas in Mexico and the trafficking routes that black tar heroin would have to traverse to get to the United States, it appears that the Sinaloa Federation would benefit the most from the black tar heroin trade in Mexico -- indeed, many black tar heroin traffickers arrested in the United States have had links to the Sinaloa Federation in Mexico. However, Sinaloa's main rival, Los Zetas, are not cut out of the heroin market completely, as the Interstate Highway 35 corridor leading into South Texas (known Zetas territory) also sees a good deal of heroin trafficking. There is also a pocket of poppy cultivation in southwest Mexico under the control of Cartel Pacifico Sur, which is affiliated with Los Zetas. While the Sinaloa Federation does not have total control over poppy cultivation (and therefore black tar heroin production), the group appears to have an advantage.

Criminal Commodities Series: Methamphetamine

Methamphetamine production is on the rise in Mexico. More cost-effective to produce than other illicit drugs, meth presents distinct advantages to Mexico's criminal organizations: Unlike other drugs, it can be manufactured independent of environmental or climatic considerations. Equally advantageous is that it can be produced in small spaces on both small and industrial scales.

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Enforcing Budgetary Discipline in the Eurozone

LIONEL BONAVENTURE/AFP/Getty Images

German Chancellor Angela Merkel after the March 2 EU summit in Brussels

Summary

Twenty-five EU leaders (all but those from the United Kingdom and the Czech Republic) signed a treaty March 2 committing eurozone members to increased fiscal responsibility. The "fiscal compact," as it is known, requires signatory eurozone members to enact constitutional amendments or equally binding national legislation enforcing EU-mandated budget constraints and stipulates corrective mechanisms to be automatically enacted at a national level if a country deviates significantly from these constraints. The treaty will go into force when at least 12 of the 17 eurozone member states ratify it, after which participating countries have one year to implement mechanisms to sufficiently enforce budgetary discipline.

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Saudi Arabia and the Muslim Brotherhood: Unexpected Adversaries

ADEM ALTAN/AFP/Getty Images

A demonstrator steps on an ostrich egg with a drawing of Saudi King Abdullah on March 17 in Ankara

The political gains of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt have breathed new life into long-suppressed political Islamist forces across the Arab world. While it may appear on the surface that Saudi Arabia is supportive of the political rise of the Muslim Brotherhood, its Sunni co-religionists, a quiet but growing dispute between Saudi Arabia and Turkey over the increasing regional clout of the Muslim Brotherhood reveals the Saudi royal family's long-standing aversion to the world's oldest and largest Islamist movement.

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The State of the World: Germany's Strategy

By George Friedman
The idea of Germany having an independent national strategy runs counter to everything that Germany has wanted to be since World War II and everything the world has wanted from Germany. In a way, the entire structure of modern Europe was created to take advantage of Germany's economic dynamism while avoiding the threat of German domination. In writing about German strategy, I am raising the possibility that the basic structure of Western Europe since World War II and of Europe as a whole since 1991 is coming to a close.

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