Category: The Conversation – Global Perspectives

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Andrew Thomas, Lecturer in Middle East Studies, Deakin University

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader for 36 years, has been killed in US and Israeli airstrikes on his country, according to US President Donald Trump. Iran did not immediately confirm his death.

As one of Iran’s longest-serving leaders, Khamenei has been almost as ubiquitous in Iranian society as his predecessor, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who founded the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1979.

And despite the fact Khomeini authored the Iranian Revolution, some say Khamenei was actually the most powerful leader modern Iran has had.

In more than three decades as supreme leader, Khamenei amassed unprecedented power over domestic politics and cracked down ever more harshly on internal dissent. In recent years, he prioritised his survival – and that of his regime – above all else. His government brutally put down a popular uprising in December 2025–January 2026 that killed thousands.

Ultimately, though, Khamenei will not be remembered by most Iranians as a strong leader. Nor will he be revered. Instead, his legacy will be the profound weakness his regime brought the Islamic Republic on all fronts.

Khamenei’s rise through the ranks

Khamenei was born in the city of Marshad in northeastern Iran in 1939. As a boy, he began to form his political and religious world view by studying at Islamic seminaries in Najaf and Qom. At 13, he started to embrace ideas relating to revolutionary Islam. These included the teachings of cleric Navab Safavi, who often called for political violence against the rule of the shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.

Khamenei met Khomeini in 1958 and immediately embraced his philosophy, often referred to as “Khomeinism”.

This world view was informed by anti-colonial sentiment, Shia Islam and elements of social engineering through state planning, particularly when it came to preserving a “just” Islamic society. Khomeinism stipulates that a system of earthly laws alone cannot create a just society – Iran must draw its legitimacy from “God Almighty”.

The concept of velayat-e faqih, also known as guardianship of the jurist, is central to Khomeinism. It dictates that the supreme leader should be endowed with “all the authorities that the Prophet and infallible Imams were entitled”.

Essentially, this means Iran was to be ruled by a single scholar of Shia Islam. This is where Khomeini, and later Khamenei, would draw their sweeping power and control.

From 1962, Khamenei began almost two decades of revolutionary activity against Pahlavi (the shah) on behalf of Khomeini, who was exiled in 1964. Khamenei was arrested by the shah’s secret police in 1971 and tortured, according to his memoirs.

When the shah was overthrown in the Islamic Revolution in 1979, Khomeini returned from exile to become the new supreme leader.

Khamenei was selected to join the Revolutionary Council, which ruled alongside the provisional government. He then became deputy defence minister and assisted in organising the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). This military institution – initially created to protect the revolution and supreme leader – would become one of the most powerful political forces in Iran.

After surviving an assassination attempt in 1981, Khamenei was elected president of Iran in 1982 and again in 1985. He held the presidency during the majority of the Iran–Iraq war – a conflict that devastated both countries in both human and economic cost.

Although subordinate to the supreme leader, Khamenei wielded significant power compared to later presidents, given the revolution was still very young and the Iraq war posed a great threat to the regime. But he remained in lock-step with Khomeini’s wishes. He also managed to build a close relationship with the IRGC that would go far beyond his presidency.

A surprising choice for supreme leader

Khomeini died in June 1989 after a period of deteriorating health, with no clear successor.

Khomeini had initially supported Grand Ayatollah Hossein-Ali Montazeri to be his successor. However, Montazeri had become increasingly critical of the supreme leader’s authority and human rights violations in the country. He resigned in 1988 and was put under house arrest until his death in 2009.

Khamenei had the political credentials to lead. He was also a steadfast support of Khomeinism. However, he was seen a surprising choice for supreme leader when he was elected by the Assembly of Experts, a group of Islamic clerics.

In fact, his appointment sparked a significant amount of controversy and criticism. Some Islamic scholars believed he lacked the clerical rank of grand ayatollah, which was required under the constitution to ascend to the position. These critics believed the Iranian people would not respect the word of “a mere human being” without a proper connection to God.

A referendum was held in July 1989 to change the constitution to allow for a supreme leader who has shown “Islamic scholarship”. It passed overwhelmingly and Khamenei became an ayatollah.

Khamenei’s position had been consolidated on paper, but despite being president since 1982, he did not enjoy the same popularity as Khomeini within both the clerical elite and general public.

The constitutional amendments, however, had given Khamenei significantly more power to intervene in political affairs. In fact, he had far more power as supreme leader than Khomeini ever enjoyed.

This included the ability to determine general policies, appoint and dismiss members of the Council of Guardians, and order public referendums. He also had enough power to silence dissent with relative ease.

Consolidating power over the decades

Khamenei worked with his presidents to varying degrees, though he exercised his power to undermine legislation when he disagreed with it.

For example, he largely backed the economic agenda of President Hashemi Rafsanjani (who served from 1989 to 1997), but he often stood in the way of Mohammad Khatami (1997–2005) and Hassan Rouhani (2013–21). Both had attempted to reform Iran’s political system and foster a better relationship with the West.

Khamenei’s most famous intervention in domestic politics occurred after the first term of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (2005–13). After Ahmadinejad claimed victory in the disputed 2009 presidential election, thousands of Iranians took to the streets in one of the largest protest movements since the revolution. Khamenei backed the election result and cracked down harshly on the protesters. Dozens were killed (perhaps more), while thousands were arbitrarily arrested.

Khamenei later clashed with Ahmadinejad and warned him against seeking the presidency again in 2017. Ahmadinejad defied him, but was later barred from running.

After the death of hardline President Ebrahim Raisi in a helicopter crash in 2024, Khameini continued his manoeuvring behind the scenes. After the reformist Masoud Pezeshkian won the presidency, Khameini immediately blocked him from negotiating with the United States over sanctions relief and used his influence to thwart his economic reform agenda.

And when protests again broke out at the end of 2025 over the struggling economy, Khamenei again ordered them to be crushed by any means necessary.

A tarnished legacy

Thanks to the powers vested in him in the constitution, Khamenei also had extraordinary control over Iran’s foreign policy.

Like his mentor, Khomeini, he staunchly supported the regime’s resistance to what it considered “Western imperialism”. He was also a key architect of Iran’s regional proxy strategy, funding militant groups like Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis and others to carry out Iran’s military objectives.

Khamenei had, at times, been amenable to cooperation with the West – namely negotiating with the US over Iran’s nuclear enrichment program.

During the first Trump administration, however, Khamenei returned to a staunchly anti-Western posture. His government railed against Trump’s scuttling of the 2015 nuclear deal, the reimposed economic sanctions on Iran’s energy sector and the assassination of the head of the IRGC’s Quds force, Qassem Soleimani.

After Trump returned to office in 2025, Iran grew even weaker. And Khamenei’s anti-Western posture began to look increasingly hollow. Iran’s defeat in the 12-day war with Israel in 2025 shredded whatever legitimacy his regime had left.

In the months that followed, Khamenei ruled over a population increasingly resentful of the Iranian political system and its leadership. In the 2025–26 protests, some openly chanted for Khamenei’s death.

When Khomenei died in 1989, his state funeral was attended by millions. Mourners pulled him out of his coffin and scrambled for sacred mementos.

Though Khameini served longer, Iranians will likely not show the same grief for him.

Andrew Thomas does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has ruled Iran with defiance and brutality for 36 years. For many Iranians, he will not be revered – https://theconversation.com/ayatollah-ali-khamenei-has-ruled-iran-with-defiance-and-brutality-for-36-years-for-many-iranians-he-will-not-be-revered-259268

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Javed Ali, Associate Professor of Practice of Public Policy, University of Michigan

After U.S. and Israeli missiles struck Iran’s nuclear sites in June 2025, Tehran responded with a limited attack on the American airbase in Qatar. Five years before that, a U.S. drone strike against Qasem Soleimani, head of the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force, was met with followed by an attack on two American bases in Iraq shortly thereafter.

Expect none of that restraint by Iran’s leaders following the latest U.S. and Israeli military operation currently playing out in the Gulf nation.

In the early hours of Feb. 28, 2026, hundreds of missiles struck multiple sites in Iran. Part of “Operation Epic Fury,” as the U.S. Department of Defense has called it, the strikes follow months of U.S. military buildup in the region. But they also come after apparent diplomatic efforts, in the shape of a series of nuclear talks in Oman and Geneva aimed at a peaceful resolution.

Any such deal is surely now completely off the table. In scale and scope, the U.S. and Israel attack goes far beyond any previous strikes on the Gulf nation.

In response, Iran has said it will use “crushing” force. As an expert on Middle East affairs and a former senior official at the National Security Council during the first Trump administration, I believe the calculus both in Washington and more so in Tehran is very different from earlier confrontations: Iran’s leaders almost certainly see this as an existential threat given President Donald Trump’s statement and the military campaign already underway. And there appears to be no obvious off-ramp to avoid further escalation.

What we should expect now is a response from Tehran that utilizes all of its capabilities – even though they have been significantly degraded. And that should be a worry for all nations in the region and beyond.

The apparent aims of the US operation

It is important to note that we are in the early stages of this conflict – much is unknown.

As of Feb. 28, it is unclear who has been killed among Iran’s leadership and to what extent Iran’s ballistic missile capabilities have been degraded. The fact that ballistic missiles have been launched at regional states that host U.S. military bases suggests that, at a minimum, Iran’s military capabilities have not been entirely wiped out.

Iran fired over 600 missiles against Israel last June during their 12-day war, but media reporting and Iranian statements over the past month suggested that Iran managed to replenish some of its missile inventory, which it is now using.

Clearly Washington is intent on crippling Iran’s ballistic program, as it is that capability that allows Iran to threaten the region most directly. A sticking point in the negotiations in Geneva and Oman was U.S. officials’ insistence that both Iran’s ballistic missiles and its funneling of support to proxy groups in the region be on the table, along with the longstanding condition that Tehran ends all uranium enrichment. Tehran has long resisted attempts to have limits on its ballistic missiles as part of any negotiated nuclear deal given their importance in Iran’s national security doctrine.

This explains why some U.S. and Israeli strikes appear to be aimed at taking out Iran’s ballistic and cruise missile launch sites and production facilities and storage locations for such weapons.

With no nuclear weapon, Iran’s ballistic missiles have been the country’s go-to method for responding to any threat. And so far in the current conflict, they have been used on nations including the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Kuwait and Bahrain.

‘It will be yours to take’

But the Trump administration appears to have expanded its aims beyond removing Iran’s nuclear and non-nuclear military threat. The latest strikes have gone after leadership, too.

Among the locations of the first U.S.-Israeli strikes was a Tehran compound in which the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in known to reside, and Israel’s prime minister has confirmed that the 86-year-old leader was a target of the operation.

While the status of the supreme leader and other key members of Iran’s leadership remains unknown as of this writing, it is clear that the U.S. administration hopes that regime change will follow Operation Epic Fury. “When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take,” Trump told Iranians via a video message recorded during the early hours of the attack.

Regime change carries risks for Trump

Signaling a regime change operation may encourage Iranians unhappy with decades of repressive rule and economic woes to continue where they left off in January – when hundreds of thousands took to the street to protest.

But it carries risks for the U.S. and its interests. Iran’s leaders will no longer feel constrained, as they did after the Soleimani assassination and the June 2025 conflict. On those occasions, Iran responded in a way that was not even proportionate to its losses – limited strikes on American military bases in the region.

Now the gloves are off, and each side will be trying to land a knockout blow. But what does that constitute? The U.S. administration appears to be set on regime change. Iran’s leadership will be looking for something that goes beyond its previous retaliatory strikes – and that likely means American deaths. That eventuality has been anticipated by Trump, who warned that there might be American casualties.

So why is Trump willing to risk that now? It is clear to me that despite talk of progress in the rounds of diplomatic talks, Trump has lost his patience with the process.

On Feb. 26, after the latest round of talks in Geneva, we didn’t hear much from the U.S. side. Trump’s calculus may have been that Iran wasn’t taking the hint – made clear by adding a second carrier strike group to the other warships and hundreds of fighter aircraft sent to the region over the past several weeks – that Tehran had no option other than agreeing to the U.S. demands.

What happens next

What we don’t know is whether the U.S. strategy is now to pause and see if an initial round of strikes has forced Iran to sue for peace – or whether the initial strikes are just a prelude to more to come.

For now, the diplomatic ship appears to have sailed. Trump seems to have no appetite for a deal now – he just wants Iran’s regime gone.

In order to do that, he has made a number of calculated gambles. First politically and legally: Trump did not go through Congress before ordering Operation Epic Fury. Unlike 23 years ago when President George W. Bush took the U.S. into Iraq, there is no war authorization giving the president cover.

Instead, White House lawyers must have assessed that Trump can carry out this operation under his Article 2 powers to act as commander in chief. Even so, the 1973 War Powers Act will mean the clock is now ticking. If the attacks are not concluded in 60 days, the administration will have to go back to Congress and say the operation is complete, or work with Congress for an authorization to use force or a formal declaration of war.

The second gamble is whether Iranians will heed his call to remove a regime that many have long wanted gone. Given the ferocity of the regime’s response to the protests in January, which resulted in the deaths of thousands of Iranians, are Iranians willing to face down Iran’s internal security forces and drive what remains of the regime from power?

Third, the U.S. administration has made a bet that the Iranian regime – even confronted with an existential threat – does not have the capability to drag the U.S. into a lengthy conflict to inflict massive casualties.

And this last point is crucial. Experts know Tehran has no nuclear bomb and only has a limited stockpile of drones and cruise and ballistic missiles.

But it can lean on unconventional capabilities. Terrorism is a real concern – either through the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force, which coordinates Iran’s unconventional warfare, or through its partnership with Hezbollah in Lebanon. Or actors like the Houthis in Yemen or Shia militias in Iraq may seek to conduct attacks against U.S. interests in solidarity with Iran or directed to do so by the regime.

A mass casualty event may put political pressure on Trump, but I cannot see it leading to U.S. boots on ground in Iran. The American public doesn’t have the appetite for such an eventuality, and that would necessitate Trump gaining Congressional approval, which for now has not yet materialized.

No one has a crystal ball, and it is early in an operation that will likely go on for days, if not longer. But one thing is clear: Iran’s regime is facing an existential threat. Do not expect it to show restraint.

Javed Ali does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Iran will respond to US-Israeli strikes as existential threats to the regime – because they are – https://theconversation.com/iran-will-respond-to-us-israeli-strikes-as-existential-threats-to-the-regime-because-they-are-277176

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Bamo Nouri, Honorary Research Fellow, Department of International Politics, City St George’s, University of London

US and Iranian negotiators met in Geneva earlier this week in what mediators described as the most serious and constructive talks in years. Oman’s foreign minister, Badr Albusaidi, spoke publicly of “unprecedented openness,” signalling that both sides were exploring creative formulations rather than repeating entrenched positions. Discussions showed flexibility on nuclear limits and sanctions relief, and mediators indicated that a principles agreement could have been reached within days, with detailed verification mechanisms to follow within months.

These were not hollow gestures. Real diplomatic capital was being spent. Iranian officials floated proposals designed to meet US political realities – including potential access to energy sectors and economic cooperation. These were gestures calibrated to allow Donald Trump to present any deal as tougher and more advantageous than the 2015 agreement he withdrew the US from in May 2018. Tehran appeared to understand the optics Washington required, even if contentious issues such as ballistic missiles and regional proxy networks remained outside the immediate framework. Then, in the middle of these talks, the bridge was shattered.

Sensing how close the negotiations were — and how imminent military escalation had become — Oman’s foreign minister, Badr Albusaidi, made an emergency dash to Washington in a last-ditch effort to preserve the diplomatic track.

In an unusually public move for a mediator, he appeared on CBS to outline just how far the talks had progressed. He described a deal that would eliminate Iranian stockpiles of highly enriched uranium, down-blend existing material inside Iran, and allow full verification by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) — with the possibility of US inspectors participating alongside them. Iran, he suggested, would enrich only for civilian purposes. A principles agreement, he indicated, could be signed within days. It was a remarkable disclosure — effectively revealing the contours of a near-breakthrough in an attempt to prevent imminent war.

But rather than allowing diplomacy to conclude, the US and Israel have launched coordinated strikes across Iran. Explosions were reported in Tehran and other cities. Trump announced “major combat operations,”, framing them as necessary to eliminate nuclear and missile threats while urging Iranians to seize the moment and overthrow their leadership. Iran responded with missile and drone attacks targeting US bases and allied states across the region.

What is most striking is not merely that diplomacy failed, but that it failed amid visible progress. Mediators were openly discussing a viable framework; both sides had demonstrated flexibility – a pathway to constrain nuclear escalation appeared tangible. Choosing military escalation at that moment undermines the premise that negotiation is a genuine alternative to war. It signals that even active diplomacy offers no guarantee of restraint. Peace was not naïve. It was plausible.

Iran’s approach in Geneva was strategic, not submissive. Proposals involving economic incentives – including energy cooperation – were not unilateral concessions but calculated compromises designed to structure a politically survivable agreement in Washington. The core objective was clear: constrain Iran’s nuclear programme through enforceable limits and intrusive verification, thereby addressing the very proliferation risks that sanctions and threats of force were meant to prevent.

Talks had moved beyond rhetorical posturing toward concrete proposals. For the first time in years, there was credible movement toward stabilising the nuclear issue. By attacking during that negotiation window, Washington and its allies have not only derailed a diplomatic opening but have cast doubt on the durability of American commitments to negotiated solutions. The message to Tehran – and to other adversaries weighing diplomacy – is stark: even when talks appear to work, they can be overtaken by force.

Iran is not Iraq or Libya

Advocates of escalation often invoke Iraq in 2003 or Libya in 2011 as precedents for rapid regime collapse under pressure. Those analogies are misleading. Iraq and Libya were highly personalised systems, overly dependent on narrow patronage networks and individual rulers. Remove the centre, and the structure imploded.

Iran is structurally different. It is not a dynastic dictatorship but an ideologically entrenched state with layered institutions, doctrinal legitimacy and a deeply embedded security apparatus, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Its authority is intertwined with religious, political and strategic narratives cultivated over decades. It has endured sanctions, regional isolation and sustained external pressure without fracturing.

Even a previous US-Israeli campaign in 2025 that lasted 12 days failed to eliminate Tehran’s retaliatory capacity. Far from collapsing, the state absorbed pressure and responded. Hitting such a system with maximum force does not guarantee implosion; it may instead consolidate internal cohesion and reinforce narratives of external aggression that the leadership has long leveraged.

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Read more:
The US and Israel’s attack may have left Iran stronger

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The mirage of regime change

Rhetoric surrounding the strikes has already shifted from tactical objectives to the language of regime change. US and Israeli leaders framed military action not solely as neutralising missile or nuclear capabilities, but as an opportunity for Iranians to overthrow their government. That calculus – regime change by force – is historically fraught with risk.

The Iraq invasion should be a cautionary tale. The US spent more than a decade cultivating multiple Iraqi opposition groups – yet dismantling the centralised state apparatus still produced chaos, insurgency and fragmentation. The vacuum gave rise to extremist organisations such as IS, drawing the US into years of renewed conflict.

Approaching Iran with similar assumptions ignores both its institutional resilience and the complexity of regional geopolitics. Sectarian divisions, entrenched alliances and proxy networks mean that destabilisation in Tehran would not remain contained. It could rapidly spill across borders and harden into prolonged confrontation.

A region wired for escalation

Iran has invested heavily in asymmetric capabilities precisely to deter and complicate external intervention. Its missile, drone and naval systems are embedded along the Strait of Hormuz — a chokepoint for global energy — and linked into a network of regional allies and militias.

In the current escalation, Tehran has already launched retaliatory missile and drone strikes against US military bases and allied territories in the Gulf, hitting locations in Iraq, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates (including Abu Dhabi), Kuwait and Qatar in direct response to US and Israeli strikes on Iran’s cities, including Tehran, Qom and Isfahan. Explosions have been reported in Bahrain and the UAE, with at least one confirmed fatality in Abu Dhabi, and several bases housing US personnel have been struck or targeted, underscoring how the conflict has already spread beyond Iran’s borders

A full-scale regional war is now more likely than it was a week ago. Miscalculation could draw multiple states into conflict, inflame sectarian fault lines and disrupt global energy markets. What might have remained a contained nuclear dispute now risks expanding into a wider geopolitical confrontation.

What about Trump’s promise of no more forever wars?

Trump built his political brand opposing “endless wars” and criticising the Iraq invasion. “America First” promised strategic restraint, hard bargaining and an aversion to open-ended intervention. Escalating militarily at the very moment diplomacy was advancing sits uneasily with that doctrine and revives questions about the true objectives of US strategy in the Middle East.

If a workable nuclear framework was genuinely emerging, abandoning it in favour of escalation invites a deeper question: does sustained tension serve certain strategic preferences more comfortably than durable peace?

Trump’s Mar-a-Lago address announcing the strikes carried unmistakable echoes of George W. Bush before the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Military action was framed as reluctant yet necessary – a pre-emptive move to eliminate gathering threats and secure peace through strength. The rhetoric of patience exhausted and danger confronted before it fully materialises closely mirrors the language Bush used to justify the march into Baghdad.

The parallel extends beyond tone. Bush cast the Iraq war as liberation as well as disarmament, promising Iraqis freedom from dictatorship. Trump similarly urged Iranians to reclaim their country, implicitly linking force to regime change. In Iraq, that fusion of shock and salvation produced not swift democratic renewal but prolonged instability. The assumption that military force can reorder political systems from the outside has already been tested – and its costs remain visible.

The central challenge now facing the US is not simply Iran’s military capability. It is credibility. Abandoning negotiations mid-course signals that diplomacy can be overridden by force even when progress is visible. That perception will resonate far beyond Tehran.

Peace was never guaranteed. It was limited and imperfect, focused primarily on nuclear constraints rather than human rights or regional proxy networks. But it was plausible – and closer than many assumed. Breaking the bridge while building it does more than halt a single agreement – it risks convincing both sides that negotiation itself is futile.

In that world, trust erodes, deterrence hardens and aggression – not agreement – becomes the default language of international power. What we are witnessing is yet another clear indication that the rules-based order has been consigned to the history books.

Bamo Nouri does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Iran has been attacked by US and Israel when peace was within reach – https://theconversation.com/iran-has-been-attacked-by-us-and-israel-when-peace-was-within-reach-277175

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By William M. LeoGrande, Professor of Government, American University School of Public Affairs

A boat carrying 10 heavily armed men entered Cuban territorial waters on Feb. 25, 2026, intent, according to officials in Havana, on infiltrating the island nation and undermining the communist government through acts of sabotage and terrorism. When the men opened fire on an approaching Cuban Border Guard patrol boat, the border guards returned fire, killing four and wounding the other six. Another Cuban American who had allegedly flown to Cuba from the United States to meet the infiltration team on the beach was later arrested.

While details about the incident continue to come out, the gun battle comes at a time of heightened tensions between Cuba and the United States, which for weeks has been pursuing a de facto total oil blockade of the island. The latest episode is also reminiscent of the early 1960s, when Cuban exiles, trained and armed by the CIA, tried to infiltrate Cuba to conduct acts of sabotage and assassinate the leaders of the Cuban Revolution.

As a longtime expert on U.S. foreign policy toward Latin America and co-author of a history of the bilateral diplomacy between the United States and Cuba, I know that Cuba’s exile community has long contained paramilitary elements. Encouraged by Washington’s intensified sanctions and heated rhetoric, and a weakened government in Havana, these elements seem to sense an opportunity now.

Cuba’s exiled paramilitaries

Following the triumph of the Cuban Revolution and Fidel Castro’s rise to power in 1959, U.S. policy toward the new government was antagonistic almost from the start.

In 1961, the CIA under President John F. Kennedy organized the Bay of Pigs invasion – a military operation by exiled Cubans aimed at overthrowing the young Castro government.

The attempted invasion was a “perfect failure,” in the words of author Theodore Draper, after which the agency recruited a number of the invaders to continue to wage irregular war against Cuba. They were part of Operation Mongoose, the Kennedy administration’s multifaceted program of diplomatic, economic, political and paramilitary pressure aimed at overthrowing the Cuban government.

The CIA’s financial support for exile paramilitary groups continued into the late 1960s, until it was phased out because of their ineffectiveness. Although the CIA gave up on overthrowing Castro by force of arms, the paramilitary exile groups did not.

Two of the most prominent groups – Alpha 66 and Omega 7 – continued their war against the Cuban government for years with tacit U.S. support. “We should not inhibit Cuban exile activity against their homeland,” President Richard Nixon wrote in 1971 in response to Coast Guard efforts to arrest members of Alpha 66. Five years later, two of the most prominent paramilitary leaders, Orlando Bosch and Luis Posada Carriles, orchestrated the bombing of a civilian airliner, Cubana Flight 455, killing all 73 people on board.

A change in attitudes

Frustrated by their inability to depose the Cuban government, the paramilitary groups turned their attention inward. In the late 1970s, these groups launched a campaign of terrorist bombings and assassinations mainly targeting Cuban Americans who dared speak out in favor of rapprochement with their homeland. In 1979, two members of the Committee of 75, Cuban Americans who traveled to Cuba to meet with Castro to secure the release of political prisoners, were assassinated by Omega 7.

President Ronald Reagan was certainly no friend of Castro’s Cuba, but his Justice Department launched a major crackdown on the U.S.-based paramilitary groups, winning convictions against a number of their members.

The terrorist attacks subsided, but the martial impulse has remained alive among some Cuban American extremists. Small groups have continued to hold weekend military training exercises in the Everglades in Florida, home to the world’s largest Cuban diaspora. Periodically over the years, some of these weekend warriors have tried to infiltrate Cuba. Almost always, they are quickly captured by Cuban police. The most recent firefight seems to be the latest of these incidents, albeit an unusually violent one.

Ratcheting up US hostility to Cuba

The number of these incursions, along with attempts by Cuban Americans to solicit acts of sabotage over social media, have increased in recent years as relations between Cuba and the U.S. have deteriorated, now at their lowest point in decades.

In his first administration, President Donald Trump reversed President Barack Obama’s 2014 Cuban thaw by imposing the toughest economic sanctions since the 1960s. President Joe Biden left most of those sanctions in place, even as the Cuban economy suffered during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Now in his second term, Trump has turned the screws even tighter by cutting off Cuba’s oil supply from Venezuela and threatening other countries if they send oil to Cuba. The result is a profound, unprecedented economic decline on the island that threatens to precipitate a humanitarian crisis.

Both Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who built his political career by being the most vocal anti-Cuban government member of Congress, have declared Cuba a failed state and predict its imminent collapse almost daily.

These predictions from the White House, along with the seemingly unsustainable economic crisis on the island, have created an expectation that the Cuban government cannot survive. In this atmosphere, Cuban American militants might well conclude that the long-awaited moment has arrived, and those who fancy themselves soldiers might well decide to take up arms and head south to witness, participate in or even catalyze the demise of the government they have hated so much and for so long.

But Cuba is not a failed state, claims from the White House notwithstanding. The Cuban government is still fully capable of maintaining public order and defending its coastline, as the 10 people that allegedly tried to infiltrate the island found out.

Trump and his hawkish advisers, including Rubio, appear to want to force Cuba into submission, much as they have tried to do in Venezuela.

But there are no visible signs of cracks in the regime and no organized opposition to it. Many Cubans remain fiercely nationalistic and are not likely to accept any deal that requires them to surrender their national sovereignty by remaking their political or economic system to please the United States.

Absent some kind of diplomatic agreement between Washington and Havana, the Cuban economy will continue to deteriorate under the weight of the ongoing oil blockade and all the other elements of the U.S. economic embargo. This will deepen the misery of people living in Cuba and risks prompting other exiles into launching paramilitary adventures in hopes of exploiting Havana’s weakness.

William M. LeoGrande is affiliated with The Quincy Institute as a Non-resident Fellow

– ref. Cuba’s speedboat shootout recalls long history of exile groups engaged in covert ops aimed at regime change – https://theconversation.com/cubas-speedboat-shootout-recalls-long-history-of-exile-groups-engaged-in-covert-ops-aimed-at-regime-change-277049

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Nicholas Morieson, Research Fellow, Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University

Artificial intelligence (AI) is at a very Chinese time in its life. Recent moves from Chinese AI labs are throwing the dominance of American “frontier labs” such as Google and OpenAI into question.

Last week ByteDance, the company behind TikTok, released an AI video-generating tool called Seedance 2.0 which produces high-quality film-like clips from text prompts, with a casual disregard for copyright concerns. This week Anthropic, the US company behind the chatbot Claude, said three Chinese AI labs created thousands of fake accounts to harvest Claude’s answers in a practice called “distillation” which can be used to improve AI models.

These events have led to suggestions that China may be gaining the upper hand in the battle to dominate AI. So, is China winning the “AI race”?

Cheap, widely used tools

While most advanced frontier models are still made by American companies, China is pushing hard to develop cheap, widely used AI tools, which could create global dependence on Chinese platforms.

Reuters reports the industry is bracing for a “flurry” of low-cost Chinese AI models, with Chinese systems repeatedly driving usage costs down.

What’s the plan? China’s official AI policy documents suggest China sees AI as “a new engine for building China into both a manufacturing and cyber superpower”, and “a new engine of economic development”.

Since 2017, China has recognised that the technology is at the centre of “international competition”. “By 2030,” one key policy document says, China’s AI “technology and application should achieve world-leading levels, making China the world’s primary AI innovation center”.

This focus on becoming the dominant player in AI helps explain why Chinese firms are pushing hard on price. If you can make your AI cheap enough, you might just make it globally ubiquitous.

Cost helps determine who adopts AI first, and which models are first implemented in software and services. Even if the United States remains ahead on most elite benchmarks, Chinese products could still become globally influential if they are widely used and widely depended upon.

High-tech soft power

But China does not present its AI technology to the world as only benefiting itself. Instead, it’s pitched as a contribution to humanity.

A 2019 statement of “governance principles” from a national AI governance expert committee argues that AI development should enhance “the common well-being of humanity” and “serve the progress of human civilization”.

These phrases portray AI as a technology that advances the human story itself, rather than only serving Chinese interests. It suggests Chinese AI leadership is good for everyone.

This is an example of Chinese soft power. Tools such as Seedance may threaten Hollywood’s business model, but they do something else too. High-quality, low-cost generative media can spread quickly.

If Chinese systems become widespread, they can influence creators, developer habits, and platform dependencies, especially in non-Western markets that need affordable tools and may dislike American tech dominance.

The spread of the ‘Chinese model’

For liberal democracies such as the United Kingdom, Australia and Canada, the growth of Chinese AI tools creates a strategic headache. It will not be easy to manage security concerns about Chinese technology while avoiding technological isolation if Chinese AI tools become widely adopted.

There is a darker side to China’s AI tools. US think-tank Freedom House describes China as having the world’s “worst conditions for internet freedom”, and suggests other nations are now “embracing the ‘Chinese model’ of extensive censorship and automated surveillance”.

In 2022, the Cyberspace Administration of China issued rules for the algorithms that curate news feeds and short video platforms. Providers are required to “uphold mainstream value orientations” and “vigorously disseminate positive energy”.

These algorithms are important because they shape what people see and what is suppressed. As a result, these rules suggest the Chinese government is deeply concerned with controlling information across its social media platforms and AI tools.

A dilemma for third parties

Not every Chinese AI tool is a propaganda weapon. Rather, China is building world-class AI technology within an authoritarian system that prioritises the control of information.

This means China’s ability to make generative AI commercially powerful will likely also, despite its claims about serving “human civilisation”, make censorship and narrative management cheaper and easier.

China’s business and soft-power model is a much bigger story than just Seedance’s cavalier attitude towards copyright or Anthropic’s concerns about intellectual property. China’s goal is to build AI tools that rival those created by America’s tech giants, and to make them inexpensive and adopted globally.

For other countries, this may create a dilemma. Once a technology becomes a standard, it can be difficult to justify using a different product.

The question that remains is whether liberal democracies can adopt China’s low-cost products without drifting into dependence on systems shaped by an authoritarian political model.

Nicholas Morieson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. How China is betting cheap AI will get the world hooked on its tech – https://theconversation.com/how-china-is-betting-cheap-ai-will-get-the-world-hooked-on-its-tech-276878

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Amy Hume, Lecturer In Theatre (Voice), Victorian College of the Arts, The University of Melbourne

Few actors are imitated as often as Michael Caine. Even Michael Caine has imitated Michael Caine.

His voice has been used in birthday card greetings and been the source of jokes in various comedy sketches. It is synonymous with a certain type of Britishness.

Last week, artificial intelligence company ElevenLabs announced Caine has licensed his voice to the company. It will be available on their ElevenReader app, which allows you to listen to any text in a voice of your choosing, as well as being available on their licensing platform, Iconic Marketplace.

To understand why Caine’s voice is so iconic (and wanted by AI) we need to look deeper at what people actually hear in it.

Why do people love listening to Michael Caine?

Caine was born in London in 1933. His mother was a cook and a cleaner, and his father worked in a fish market. Caine speaks with a Cockney accent, setting him aside from most other actors of his generation.

Cockney hails from London’s East End and is often associated with London’s working class – think Eliza Doolittle from My Fair Lady, the Artful Dodger from Oliver!, or Bert the Chimney Sweep from Mary Poppins (although Dick van Dyke’s accent is not the most accurate, it’s still recognisably Cockney).

Traditionally, you were said to be a true Cockney if you were born within earshot of the Bow Bells – the bells of St. Mary-le-Bow church on Cheapside.

That distinctiveness matters because the accent carried heavy class meaning in mid-20th century Britain.

We don’t hear many contemporary examples of Cockney. Accents change and evolve over time and it has gradually been replaced by a new dialect called Multicultural London English (MLE).

While most actors of his age acquired a “stage accent” – known as Received Pronunciation (RP) – Caine made a conscious decision to hold onto his working-class roots and not change his accent. Instead, he built his career on it.

He once said,

I could’ve gone to voice lessons, but I always thought if I had any use […] I could fight the class system in England.

His accent became cultural capital and helped him land roles in Alfie (1966), The Italian Job (1969) and Jack Carter (1971). By the 1970s, he was a British cultural icon.

What do we hear when we hear celebrity voices?

Hearing a person’s voice is never just about acoustics. We hear social meaning: culture, identity, character and story.

Sociolinguist Asif Agha coined the term “enregisterment” to describe how a way of speaking becomes publicly recognised as signalling particular social types and values.

Over time, Caine’s voice has become enregistered as a recognisable Cockney accent associated with East London and historically linked to a working-class identity. Hearing his voice activates a socially shared register of meanings attached to Cockney.

This contrasts with, say, Queen Elizabeth II, whose accent was enregistered with royalty, prestige and wealth.

Another useful concept here is what sociolinguists sometimes call “dialectal memes”: the images and character types that circulate around particular accents. These memes are transmitted through books, television, film, and even celebrity figures themselves.

Caine has been a carrier of Cockney dialectal memes in popular culture.

When you look at it this way, AI voice licensing commodifies not just the acoustic properties of Caine’s voice, but the enregistered social meanings audiences recognise in it.

What AI licensing means for Caine

ElevenLabs describes its Iconic Marketplace platform as “the performer-first approach the entertainment industry has been calling for”. Through licensing, actors maintain ownership of their voices in a digital, AI landscape.

Caine licensing his voice theoretically ensures he receives credit and compensation, and prevents unauthorised clones appearing elsewhere.

It is possible this is exactly the direction actors want AI to go in – for use of their voice to be controlled by themselves, with clear credit and payment.

However, this model is not without risk to the actor or the listener. We should ask: do we need to hear something in Caine’s voice? Will we process information differently or hear it with more authority if it’s delivered in the voice of a cultural icon like Caine?

Giving power over to machines

People who admire Caine may want him to read to them. Some will be willing to pay for it. We need to remain conscious of the decisions we are making here.

In the 1960s, computer scientist Joseph Weizenbaum, creator of the world’s first chatbot, Eliza, warned about the dangers of forming relationships with machines. He was alarmed to see users confiding in Eliza and responding to the chatbot as if it actually understood them, even when they knew it did not.

What happens if an AI voice is not actually generic, but recognisably tied to a real human?

An actor’s likeness and voice may be protected with licensing, but their human self is not. That creates a pathway to attachment or even infatuation.

Caine is not just licensing his voice, but also the Cockney persona audiences recognise in it. Suddenly, a machine speaks with the authority of a real human behind it.

Amy Hume does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Michael Caine’s voice is iconic. Why would he sell that to AI? – https://theconversation.com/michael-caines-voice-is-iconic-why-would-he-sell-that-to-ai-276506

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Simon Theobald, Research Fellow, University of Oxford; University of Notre Dame Australia

As Iranian and US diplomats meet in Geneva for crucial negotiations to avoid a potential war, opposition groups in exile are sniffing an opportunity.

The Islamic Republic faces its greatest political crisis since its inception. US President Donald Trump is threatening an imminent attack if Iran doesn’t capitulate on its nuclear program. And anti-regime protesters continue to gather, despite a brutal government crackdown that has killed upwards of 20,000 people, and possibly more.

Talk of a future Iran after the fall of the Islamic regime has grown increasingly fervent. And buoyed by cries heard during some of the protests in Iran of “long live the shah” (the former monarch of Iran), the voices of royalists in the Iranian diaspora are everywhere.

But is a return of the shah really what Iranians want, and what would be best for the country?

What are the monarchists promising?

Iran’s monarchy was ancient, but the Pahlavi dynasty that last ruled the country only came to power in 1925 when Reza Khan, a soldier in the army, overthrew the previous dynasty.

Khan adopted the name Pahlavi, and attempted to bring Iran closer to Western social and economic norms. He was also an authoritarian leader, famous for banning the hijab, and was ultimately forced into exile by the British following the Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran in 1941.

His son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, attempted to continue his father’s reforms, but was similarly authoritarian. Presiding over a government that tolerated little dissent, he was ultimately forced out by the huge tide of opposition during the Islamic Revolution of 1979.

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Read more:
How Iran’s current unrest can be traced back to the 1979 revolution

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Now, the exiled crown prince, 65-year-old Reza Pahlavi, is being touted by many in the diaspora as the most credible and visible opposition figure to be able to lead the country if and when the Islamic Republic collapses.

Pro-monarchy groups such as the US-based National Union for Democracy in Iran (NUFDI) have become vocal supporters of Pahlavi.

In early 2025, the NUFDI launched a well-coordinated and media savvy “Iran Prosperity Project”, offering what the group claimed was a roadmap for economic recovery in a post-Islamic Republic Iran. Pahlavi himself penned the foreword.

Then, in July, the group released its “Emergency Phase Booklet”, with a vision for a new political system in Iran.

Although the document is mostly written in the language of international democratic norms, it envisions bestowing the crown prince with enormous powers. He’s called the “leader of the national uprising” and given the right to veto the institutions and selection processes in a transitional government.

One thing the document is missing is a response to the demands of Iran’s many ethnic minority groups for a federalist model of government in Iran.

Instead, under the plan, the government would remain highly centralised under the leadership of Pahlavi, at least until a referendum that the authors claim would determine a transition to either a constitutional monarchy or democratic republic.

But students of Iranian history cannot help but note echoes of the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini had promised a more democratic Iran with a new constitution, and without himself or other clerics in power.

After the revolution, though, Khomeini quickly grasped the reigns of power.

Online attacks against opponents

Pahlavi and his supporters have also struggled to stick to the principles of respectful debate and tolerance of different viewpoints.

When interviewed, Pahlavi has avoided discussing the autocratic nature of his father’s rule and the human rights abuses that occurred under it.

But if Pahlavi tends to avoid hard questions, his supporters can be aggressive. At the Munich Security Conference in February, British-Iranian journalist Christiane Amanpour interviewed the crown prince.

After the interview, Amanpour’s tough questions resulted in an explosion of anger from his supporters. In a video that has been widely shared on X, royalists can be seen heckling Amanpour, saying she “insulted” the crown prince.

In online forums, the language can be even more intimidating. Amanpour asked Pahlavi point-blank if he would tell his supporters to stop their “terrifying” attacks on ordinary Iranians.

While saying he doesn’t tolerate online attacks, he added, “I cannot control millions of people, whatever they say on social media, and who knows if they are real people or not.”

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Read more:
The rise of Reza Pahlavi: Iranian opposition leader or opportunist?

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Do Iranians want a monarchy?

As I’ve noted previously, the monarchist movement also talks as though it is speaking for the whole nation.

But during the recent protests, some students could be heard shouting: “No to monarchy, no to the leadership of the clerics, yes to an egalitarian democracy”.

The level of support for the shah within Iran is unclear, in part because polling is notoriously difficult.

A 2024 poll by the GAMAAN group, an organisation set up by two Iranian academics working in the Netherlands, attempted to gauge political sentiment in Iran. Just over 30% of those polled indicated Pahlavi would be their first choice if a free and fair election were held.

But the poll doesn’t indicate why people said they wanted to vote for him. It also showed just how fragmented the opposition is, with dozens of names getting lower levels of support.

The future of Iran is very unclear at the moment. Even if the Islamic Republic were to be dislodged – a very big “if” – the transition could very well be chaotic and violent.

Would Pahlavi make a good leader? For many critics, his behaviour, and that of his supporters, call into question the royalists’ promises of a more liberal and tolerant Iran.

Simon Theobald receives funding from the University of Oxford and the University of Notre Dame Australia.

– ref. Iran’s exiled crown prince is touting himself as a future leader. Is this what’s best for the country? – https://theconversation.com/irans-exiled-crown-prince-is-touting-himself-as-a-future-leader-is-this-whats-best-for-the-country-276629

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By James Trapani, Associate Lecturer of History and International Relations, Western Sydney University

After toppling Venezuela’s leader earlier this year, the Trump administration has turned its sights on Cuba. The near-total blockade of the island is now posing the greatest challenge to the government since the Cuban missile crisis in 1962.

Cuba is quickly running out of oil, creating a dire political and economic crisis for the island’s 11 million residents.

US President Donald Trump’s embargo has prevented any oil tankers from reaching the island for months. A ship carrying Russian fuel is now reportedly on the way to the island to attempt to break the blockade, but the US has seized other ships that have previously tried.

The Trump administration has also threatened tariffs on any nation that tries to send Cuba fuel, putting Latin American leaders in an uncomfortable position. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has called out the embargo as “very unfair”, but she’s been careful not to antagonise Trump by putting an emphasis on the Cuban “people”, not the government.

This is not the first time the US has isolated Cuba, or coerced Latin American leaders to take part. Cuba has been under a US embargo for the past 66 years, which has stunted its economy and caused widespread human suffering.

The island has always found a way to get by, but can it survive this new round of American pressure?

Animosity grows in the 1950s

The Cuban Revolution caught the United States by surprise in 1959. During the Cold War, the US had supported dictatorships in Latin America, such as Cuba’s Fulgencio Batista, with political, financial and military support, creating widespread anti-US activism across the region.

After coming to power, revolutionary leader Fidel Castro instituted modest reforms to land tenure and infrastructure to support the impoverished people. Then-US President Dwight Eisenhower opposed these moves because of their impact on US commercial interests on the island. This opposition turned into a US embargo of Cuban sugar imports in 1960.

In response, Castro looked to the Soviets as an export alternative. Eisenhower retaliated by refusing to ship oil to Cuba, leading Castro to sign an oil deal with the Soviets and eventually nationalise American and British refineries. In 1961, Castro declared his adherence to “Marxism-Leninism”.

Castro and Cuba were hugely popular throughout Latin America. When the Cuban military defeated the CIA-trained force of exiled Cuban fighters at the Bay of Pigs in 1961, Castro was lauded for standing up to the US, though few knew of the military and intelligence support coming from the Soviets.

And when President John F. Kennedy began the campaign to remove Cuba from the Organisation of American States (OAS) in 1961, most Latin American democracies moved to block it.

To bring those leaders to his side, Kennedy used a carrot-and-stick approach. He proposed an “alliance for progress” to meet the “basic needs of the [Latin] American people for homes, work and land, health and schools”. But his government also passed the Foreign Assistance Act, which established a total blockade of the island and prohibited US aid to any country providing assistance to Cuba.

The OAS removed Cuba as a member the following year and, in 1964, voted to embargo all trade to Cuba, except food and medicine.

Life under the embargo

The embargo prevented Cuba from reaching the modern technological age. Instead, it existed in socialist bubble, emphasising the care of its people over economic development.

Nonetheless, Cuba’s Cold War economic growth was comparable to its neighbours. In 1970, the nominal GDP per capita for Cuba was US$645 (A$900), slightly lower than Mexico and about double the Dominican Republic. By 1990, it was US$2,565 (A$3,600), about 80% of Mexico’s and more than triple the Dominican Republic’s.

Cuba was not industrialised, but the country did reach full literacy before any other Latin American nation and extended health care to all Cubans. Cuba then exported its teachers and doctors throughout Latin America, and beyond.

However, life on the island was still difficult, especially after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

With no clear replacement for Soviet imports and subsidies, the economy began to buckle. From 1990 to 1994 (a time known as the “Special Period”), food production decreased by 40%, leading to food rationing, malnutrition and other health issues.

Protests broke out across the island in 1994 and some 35,000 Cubans fled on boats for Florida.

Cuba and the US after the Cold War

However, the end of the Cold War brought newfound sympathy and assistance from Cuba’s neighbours. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, for example, provided Cuba with oil in exchange for Cuban doctors.

Then, in 2009, the OAS voted to readmit Cuba and allow for regional trade and tourism again.

US President Barack Obama followed suit in 2014, saying the US embargo of Cuba had “failed”.

His administration then initiated what would become known as the “Cuban thaw”. Then-President Raul Castro visited Washington in 2015 and, the following year, Obama became the first US president to visit Cuba since 1928.

Obama did not end the embargo, but he did open the door to US tourism, providing a lifeline for Cuba’s economy.

Why is Trump punishing the island again?

Now, Trump is reimposing the Cold War-era embargo on the island and ramping up the pressure on President Miguel Díaz-Canel’s government.

The White House claims Cuba presents an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to the United States, saying the island is cooperating with “dangerous adversaries” on intelligence activities, chief among them Russia and China.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has condemned Trump’s embargo, saying “we do not accept anything like this”.

If Russian oil makes it to Cuba, more aid could follow. If that eventuates, the US will have invited Russia into its backyard again, laying the foundation for another Cold War-style stalemate, with the Cuban people once more trapped in the middle.

James Trapani does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Cuba has survived 66 years of US-led embargoes. Will Trump’s blockade break it now? – https://theconversation.com/cuba-has-survived-66-years-of-us-led-embargoes-will-trumps-blockade-break-it-now-276065

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Stacey Pizzino, Lecturer, School of Public Health, The University of Queensland

When a war ends and peace agreements are signed, most people assume the danger is over. But for many communities around the world the danger remains in the ground, waiting.

Landmines and other explosives left behind after a conflict can stay active for decades – buried in the paths to school, in the fields that feed families and in the areas where children play.

In some countries, such as Laos and the Solomon Islands, bombs from conflicts decades ago still injure and kill.

This quiet danger isn’t a distant problem. Today, at least 57 countries are contaminated by landmines and other explosive ordnance, including mortars and grenades.

At the same time, some governments are stepping back from the Landmine Ban Treaty, the first comprehensive treaty aimed at eliminating landmines in conflicts. Decisions made in parliaments today can translate into hazards underfoot for years to come.

Our new research is aimed at understanding the ongoing risk landmines pose. The study is the world’s largest analysis of landmine and explosive ordnance casualties. And the data allows us to answer critical questions: who dies from these weapons, and why?

What do the numbers tell us?

In our study, we analysed 105,913 casualties across 17 conflict-affected countries, using operational data. These are the real world operational records routinely collected by national mine action authorities, the UN and other humanitarian organisations.

These records let us see what communities are facing without adding any burden to these often stretched services.

Across all settings, the case fatality rate was 38.8%. Put simply: for every ten people injured by landmines or other explosive ordnance around the world, nearly four die. This is extraordinarily high.

For comparison, the fatality rate for blast injuries among military personnel or civilians treated in well-resourced trauma centres is around 2%.

The gap highlights the brutal disparity between those who are injured in environments with functioning surgical and trauma care and those who are not.

Not all explosive threats are equal, either.

Improvised explosive devices (IEDs) were the most lethal weapon type in our analysis.

IEDs are increasingly used in many modern conflicts and are often remotely detonated to maximise casualties. Their explosive force and unpredictability cause devastating injuries that many local health systems are simply not equipped to manage.

Who is most affected?

Although most casualties from landmines and explosive ordnance are men, women had significantly higher odds of dying from their injuries. This likely reflects unequal access to health care, delayed treatment, and social barriers that limit mobility and decision making in many conflict-affected settings.

Children’s risks are different – they are both vulnerable and resilient.

Children are particularly at risk of detonating landmines when playing, when caught up in active conflict, or simply as bystanders.

The reason is often tragic.
Children tend to play together in groups, meaning when one child encounters an explosive remnant, several are injured at once.

Yet, overall, children in our data were more likely to survive their injuries than adults, perhaps because they sustain different injury patterns or receive care sooner when adults rush to assist.

But survival is only the beginning. Children may need multiple surgeries, new prostheses as they grow up, long-term rehabilitation and lifelong disability support. These are needs that many health systems struggle to meet.

Age also shapes outcomes. The highest odds of death were observed in adults aged 45–64. Older people may have pre-existing health issues and face greater barriers to reaching medical care, yet their needs can often be overlooked.

The human cost of explosives

The impact of landmines and explosive ordnance extends far beyond immediate injuries. These injuries disrupt people’s daily lives in ways that can entrench communities in poverty.

For example, farmers cannot safety cultivate their land because of the threat of landmines. Women gathering water or food can trigger explosives, too.

When injuries occur, families lose breadwinners and care-giving roles change, pushing households deeper into poverty.

How can we strengthen care for survivors?

There are ways to mitigate the impacts of landmines and explosive ordnance, though. This is a preventable public health crisis.

Our findings highlight the urgent need to strengthen emergency, critical and surgical care in conflict-affected areas to reduce preventable deaths.

Reliable pre-hospital care, transport and basic surgical care saves lives. So does long-term rehabilitation and disability support, especially for children who will live with the consequences of these explosive weapons and injuries for decades.

As old conflicts continue and new ones emerge, explosive ordnance keep contaminating the places where people live, play, work and travel.

Understanding who dies, and why, is essential to preventing future deaths and ensuring that peace, when it comes, offers real safety.

Stacey Pizzino received funding from the Australian government Research Training Program.

Michael Waller does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. New global study: long after war, injuries from landmines and explosives kill nearly 4 in 10 victims – https://theconversation.com/new-global-study-long-after-war-injuries-from-landmines-and-explosives-kill-nearly-4-in-10-victims-276062

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Laura Revell, Professor of Atmospheric Chemistry, University of Canterbury

When we look up at the night sky and see a satellite glide past, we might not consider climate change or the ozone layer.

Space may feel separate from the environmental systems that sustain life on Earth. But increasingly, the way we build, launch and dispose of satellites is starting to change that.

Over the past few years, the number of satellite launches has skyrocketed. There are now nearly 15,000 active satellites in orbit around the Earth, most of them part of “mega-constellations” in which each satellite has a service life of only a few years.

New satellites must be quickly launched as replacements. To avoid leaving old, dead satellites in Earth’s already-crowded low orbits, most satellite operators deliberately de-orbit them into Earth’s upper atmosphere.

Here, they burn up or break apart into smaller pieces: a process known as “demisability”. In effect, satellites have become part of throwaway culture.

That approach is now being taken to a vastly larger scale. We are concerned about the implications for Earth’s climate and atmosphere.

A sleeper risk for our climate and ozone layer

Last month, SpaceX applied to the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for permission to launch one million more satellites for untested “AI data centres”.

That sheer number isn’t the only issue. SpaceX’s Starlink V2 “mini” satellites happen to weigh about 800 kilograms (kg) – roughly the mass of a small car – with later versions expected to reach around 1,250 kg. The planned V3 satellites are larger still, comparable in scale to a Boeing 737 airliner.

Rocket launches already contribute to climate change and ozone depletion. Scaling them up to deploy a million aircraft-sized satellites would push upper-atmosphere heating and ozone loss far beyond previous estimates, with the steady burn-up of dead satellites compounding the impacts.

This comes as burnt satellite dust is already being found in the atmosphere. In 2023, scientists studying aerosols in the upper atmosphere found metals from re-entering spacecraft. Just recently, lithium has been detected from the uncontrolled re-entry of a Falcon 9 rocket.

This is just a fraction of what is to come if planned megaconstellations go ahead – and SpaceX is far from the only player. Other operators worldwide have already asked for a combined total of over one million satellites.

All the while, the full environmental consequences remain poorly understood because satellite builders rarely disclose what their spacecraft are made of.

Scientists assume a large fraction is aluminium, which burns up into alumina particles, but the exact mix of materials – and the size of the particles produced – remains poorly constrained.

But we know the very smallest particles, finer than a human hair, can stay suspended in the atmosphere for years, contributing to ozone depletion and climate change.

Following similar assumptions to a previous study, we estimate that a million satellites could mean that a teragram (one billion kgs) of alumina accumulates in the upper atmosphere – enough, alongside launch emissions, to significantly alter atmospheric chemistry and heating in dramatic ways we do not yet understand.

There is no public mandate for a single company in one country to make changes on that scale to the planet’s atmosphere.

The consequences are not confined to the atmosphere. Not all re-entering satellites burn up; debris is already hitting the ground and the chance of a casualty from megaconstellation re-entries is now about 40% per five-year cycle – rising for both people and aircraft as more satellites are added to orbit.

In space, the picture is no less stark: the Outer Space Institute’s CRASH Clock suggests a collision would occur within 3.8 days if satellites stopped avoiding each other.

Many experts agree we are in the early stages of the Kessler Syndrome: a cascading chain reaction of collisions that multiplies space debris.

Our skies are not a dumping ground

Our night sky, especially cherished in New Zealand, is one of the few things everyone on Earth still shares.

According to simulations built by astronomers, constellations on the scale proposed by SpaceX would fill the sky with many thousands of satellites visible to the naked eye anywhere on Earth. Eventually, there could be more visible satellites than visible stars.

For scientists, observing the deaths of stars and searching for new planets would become much harder. Stargazing, astrotourism and cultural astronomy would similarly be disrupted worldwide.

All of this means the FCC’s ruling on the SpaceX proposal, now open to public submissions, could affect everyone – whether through changes to the atmosphere, growing collision risks in orbit or the loss of an unspoilt night sky.

One solution being discussed is to dispose of dead satellites in orbits away from Earth. But this would require much more fuel per satellite to escape Earth’s gravity, increasing both payload and the environmental impact of rocket launches. Some debris would still return to Earth.

With SpaceX and others planning rapid expansion, global regulation is needed: in an uncapped system, regulating one firm just shifts the problem elsewhere. As the largest operator, SpaceX is best placed to lead on an environmentally sustainable solution, just as Du Pont did with phasing out CFCs in the 1980s.

A first step is to define a safe atmospheric carrying capacity for satellite launches and re-entries. Environmental assessments should cover the full lifecycle, including atmospheric effects, and address both orbital safety and impacts on cultural and research astronomy.

Whatever the regulatory outcome, using the atmosphere as a crematorium for satellites at this scale cannot be a solution.

Laura Revell receives funding from the Marsden Fund and Rutherford Discovery Fellowships, administered from New Zealand Government funding by the Royal Society Te Apārangi. She is a member of the International Ozone Commission, UN Environmental Effects Assessment Panel, UN Nuclear War Effects Panel, and a lead author on the IPCC’s 7th Assessment Report.

Michele Bannister receives funding from the Rutherford Discovery Fellowships, administered from New Zealand Government funding by the Royal Society Te Apārangi. She is a member of the International Astronomical Union’s Centre for Dark and Quiet Skies.

Samantha Lawler receives funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. She is a fellow of the Outer Space Institute, and a Visiting Erskine Fellow at the University of Canterbury.

– ref. A new space race could turn our atmosphere into a ‘crematorium for satellites’ – https://theconversation.com/a-new-space-race-could-turn-our-atmosphere-into-a-crematorium-for-satellites-276366