Daily Beast
What Makes the Tsarnaev Brothers Different from Other Mass Murderers “The naming of two suspects in the Boston Marathon bombing and the manhunt for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who was captured alive last night, have made the nightmare scenario for many American Muslims come true. The Tsarnaev brothers will forever be the poster children for a particularly…
Daily Beast
With the manhunt for the second suspect in the Boston Marathon underway, historian Charles King urges caution against tying the brothers into any Chechen movement or history. Instead, it seems we should see them as homegrown American terrorists. “The killing of one suspect in the Boston Marathon bombings and the ongoing hunt for another have…
Wall Street Journal Speakeasy Blog
The ongoing manhunt for Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev has turned attention to a faraway and unfamiliar place: Russia’s southern border region of the Caucasus. But so far the links between the horrors in Boston and this distant region—a land of stunning mountains, lush valleys, and upland villages—are tenuous. The operative comparison in the…
Christian Science Monitor
Scotland’s Alex Salmond and British Prime Minister David Cameron signed the ‘Edinburgh deal’ – allowing Scotland to hold a referendum vote on independence in 2014. As Europe’s bonds are tested, the push for Scottish independence sends a dangerous ‘go it alone’ message. The question of Scotland’s place in the United Kingdom is currently the single most pressing…
Foreign Affairs
Edinburgh’s Quest for Independence and the Future of Separatism “The monument to Sir William Wallace stands near the city of Stirling, a castle town not far from the Scottish capital of Edinburgh. On blustery days when the sun peeks through the clouds, the sandstone memorial glows golden and majestic. That is exactly the effect its…
Washington Quarterly (with Daniel Byman)
The rise of phantom states suggests that formal sovereignty has lost some of its caché. What will happen to the foundations of international relations if you can get by just fine by living in a country that nobody believes really exists? “In almost every region of the globe, there is a phantom state hovering like…
The New York Times (with Daniel Byman)
Three years ago this month, Russia and Georgia fought a brief and brutal war over an obscure slice of mountainous land called South Ossetia that had declared its independence from Georgia. Flouting international law, Russia stepped in to defend South Ossetia and later formally recognized the secessionists as a legitimate government. Hundreds died and thousands…
Foreign Affairs (with Rajan Menon)
The empty gymnasium of School No. 1 in Beslan is whipped by winds from the plains of North Ossetia, a republic in Russia’s North Caucasus region. “On September 1, 2004, the first day of classes, masked gunmen entered the elementary school and herded hundreds of children and their teachers onto the indoor basketball court. They…