A United States Air Force RF-101 Voodoo aircraft pilot photographs a Russian ship loaded with missiles while the aircraft itself casts a shadow in Port Casilda, Cuba, Nov. 6, 1962.
EPA/Defense Imagery
Fifty years ago, the United States and the Soviet Union stood on the brink of nuclear war over Soviet missiles in Cuba. Since then, the Cuban Missile Crisis has been recognised as one of the most definitive…
The 2012 northern hemisphere summer, like its two predecessors, has seen a wide range of climate extremes, many involving heat. In most recent summers there has been at least one part of the world with…
A group of Iranian pilgrims captured by the Free Syria Army who claim are Iranian Revolutionary Guards.
Al Arabiya
This week the Islamic Republic of Iran made a blunt statement, reiterating its position in relation to the on-going conflict in Syria. According to Saeed Jalili, a senior advisor to the Iranian Supreme…
President Nixon’s meeting with China’s Communist Party Leader Mao Tse Tung in 1972 began closer ties between the two countries.
Wikimedia/Office of Presidential Libraries
Now, as at the time of the Vietnam war, the global primacy of the United States is increasingly being questioned. Among the reasons are its role in the Global Financial Crisis (GFC), the continued and…
Western Governments will be recklessly ignoring their human rights obligations if they continue to support Shell in its US supreme court case.
EPA/George Esiri
We all know corporations do bad things. Big corporates have been publicly named and shamed for their participation in causing harm to people and the planet, and they are not always held to account. As…
Like Barack Obama, Richard Nixon was once a first-term president in charge of a spluttering economy.
Marion Doss
Yesterday the Federal Reserve announced limited measures to boost the economy. Whatever effect they will have on the economy, they are unlikely to be of any benefit to Obama. Indeed, history shows that…
For the past six weeks a high-level US team has been in Pakistan trying to negotiate a resumption of the convoys which travel through the country and provide Coalition forces in Afghanistan with about…
The US is growing in popularity down under … have we all got Obamamania?
AAP/Scott Barbour
When Barack Obama was under fire for his foreign policy inexperience in 2007, he told the New York Times that his unique biography could be a vital instrument in a new American foreign policy. “If you…
Stationing US troops in Darwin does not align with our foreign policy interests.
AAP/Xavier La Canna
AUSTRALIA IN THE ASIAN CENTURY – A series examining Australia’s role in the rapidly transforming Asian region. Delivered in partnership with the Australian government. Today, Professor John Langmore argues…
The Australian government faces a difficult task in balancing relationships with China and the US.
EPA/Minoru Iwasaki/Pool
The recommendation by intelligence agency ASIO that Chinese telecommunications company Huawei be banned from tendering in the National Broadband Network because of cyber security concerns, raises serious…
Republicans today went to the polls on Super Tuesday, but no clear candidate for the presidential nomination emerged.
EPA/Ryan Stone
Voting in the Super Tuesday Republican primaries has ended in every participating state except Alaska. The results have been shared: front runners Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum have all…
US-China competition could lead to a brighter clean energy future, or a trade war.
whitehouse.gov
There is a trade war brewing between the United States and China over intellectual property relating to clean technologies – particularly solar power. Steven Chu, a scientist, Nobel Laureate in Physics…
Mitt Romney has targeted voters in different market segments in his bid to win the Republican nomination.
EPA/Michael Nelson
One of the more interesting techniques emerging from the United States Republican Nomination Primary Contest has been the strategy being used in television advertising by some candidates, in particular…
No one goes to Paula Deen for health advice.
Bristol Motor Speedway Dragway
I’ll be completely up front. I love celebrity cook Paula Deen. I love the drawl, I love the finger licking, I love her ever-so-slightly inappropriate relationship with her sons. That time she described…
Can the Republican party get behind Mitt Romney despite the misgivings of the base?
AAP/Michael Reynolds
By rights, Mitt Romney should be on the ropes. In the years leading up to the Republican presidential primaries, he supported small-l liberal positions on anything from abortion and gun control to climate…
The aftermath of a bombing in Tehran that killed a nuclear scientist.
EPA/STR
Relations between Iran and the United States and its ally Israel have descended into the worst crisis in years. Concern is growing that the situation could quickly degenerate into conflict. The origins…
Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow proudly affirms his Christian faith during NFL games.
AAP/Smith
Just as acquiring a perfunctory understanding of the AFL is inevitable in southern Australia, living in New England Patriots’ heartland has forced me to pay a little attention to America’s NFL. Despite…
Suspect Bradley Manning is accused of “aiding the enemy” and faces court martial by a US military court.
EPA/BradleyManning.org/
The controversy over Wikileaks will today, at least temporarily, shift its focus from the website’s founder Julian Assange to suspected informant Private First Class Bradley Manning. Today Manning will…
Associate Professor in Islamic Studies, Director of The Centre for Islamic Studies and Civilisation and Executive Member of Public and Contextual Theology, Charles Sturt University