Putin’s Nightmares and the Threat of a Nuclear “Accident”

Posted on December 13, 2024 by Assistant Editor

Journal of Political Risk, Vol. 12, No. 12, December 2024

By Christopher Shove, Ph.D.

A mural of Putin, Hitler, and Stalin with a slogan “No More Time”. Anthony D Barraclough via Flickr.

As Russian losses mount, Putin’s threat of a nuclear incident becomes all the more likely. According to the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine report dated 10 December 2024, Russian casualties from February 24, 2022 to December 10, 2024 include the following: 755,940 personnel, 9,524 tanks, and 19,596 infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs). While Ukraine’s estimate may appear high, there is consensus from many intelligence sources that Russian losses are substantial. A recent example is the increase in losses in the Russia Kursk oblast where Ukraine counter-attacked and has occupied since August 6, 2024. Here, Ukrainian soldiers report 10 or more daily waves of Russian attacks on the Kursk battlefield with almost all stopped, resulting in massive Russian losses. As a result, Russia has transferred soldiers from other areas to the Kursk battlefield – with only losses and no gains against Ukraine’s clever tactics. Continue reading →

Rape: The Russian Tool of Conquest

Posted on June 10, 2022 by Assistant Editor

Journal of Political Risk, Vol. 10, No. 6, June 2022

Police uncover the body of Karina Yeshiva, 22, in Bucha. A forensics team of 3 is depicted excavating the body with specialised equipment in a sandy ditch.

Police uncover the body of Karina Yeshiva, 22, in Bucha. Witnesses say she was tortured, raped, and shot in the head by Russian soldiers. Source: DW.

Stephanie Wild
University of Cape Town

Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, at least 4,000 civilians have been killed. Moscow has therefore been accused of targeting civilians. However, this is not the only tactic emerging. Acts of rape and sexual violence are also emerging as a weapon of war. In fact, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) released a report on the 3rd of June stating that they had already received allegations of 124 acts of conflict-related sexual assault in Ukraine. These reported assaults have mostly been against women and girls, ranging from gang rape, to coercion, to forcibly bearing witness to acts of sexual violence perpetrated against partners and children. Concerns surrounding human traffickers exploiting existing networks are also on the rise. A United Nations Security Council meeting, in particular, brought this to the attention of the world on June 6.

Sexual violence being heavily associated with stigma and shame, the concern is that the actual figure is much higher than 124. A more accurate idea of the actual figure will only emerge with an end to the conflict. However, considering the number of reported sexual assaults, it is clear that Ukrainian women are the victims of sexual violence perpetrated by Russian soldiers each day. This points to a weaponization of sexual violence.

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Putin’s Folly

Posted on February 28, 2022 by Assistant Editor

Journal of Political Risk, Vol. 10, No. 2, February 2022

Protestors against 2022 Russia invasion of Ukraine, at the Hachiko square in Shibuya, Japan. Protesters drop the Ukrainian flag over the shoulders and hold up signs.

Protestors against 2022 Russia invasion of Ukraine, at the Hachiko square in Shibuya, Japan. Wikimedia.

Richard Shortt, Ph.D.
Leader of New Zealand’s multi-agency Combined Threat Assessment Group

The work of unravelling Putin’s folly in the Ukraine began February 24 with the firing of the first missiles and artillery shells that signalled his invasion. It will be slow, time-consuming work, assuming no national uprisings in either the Ukraine or Russia by ordinary folks demanding an end to the killing and destruction, or more significant interventions by Western powers – both of which I consider unlikely. It will, in all probability, take longer than the time Putin has left sitting on the Russian imperial throne. But it will happen.

We are currently in what I term the Chaos Phase of the work. This is where invasion leads to death, destruction, despair and defiance. It is the defiance that will ultimately lead us to the next phase, meanwhile, troops and civilians will die, infrastructure will be destroyed and damaged and people on all sides of the issue will watch in stunned horror at what modern warfare and forced occupation means in a modern-day European country.

The Russian forces will emerge victorious. There is very little doubt about that, but not before the Ukrainian efforts deliver martyrs who will fuel the next phase – Resistance. Continue reading →

The Risks of AI: An Interview with Georgetown’s Helen Toner

Posted on January 14, 2022 by Assistant Editor

Journal of Political Risk, Vol. 10, No. 1, January 2022

Helen Toner, Director of Strategy at the Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET) at Georgetown University.

Anders Corr, Ph.D.
Publisher of the Journal of Political Risk

The JPR interview with Helen Toner, the Director of Strategy at the Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET) at Georgetown University, was conducted via email between 4 January 2022 and 13 January 2022.

Corr: What are the national security risks and benefits of AI?

Toner: This is a huge question! AI is a general-purpose technology, meaning that—like electricity or the computer—its impacts will be felt across practically all industries and areas of society. Accordingly, it presents a huge range of potential risks and benefits from a national security perspective. One way of trying to summarize the possibilities might be as follows: the benefits will largely be in line with the kinds of benefits we have seen from increasingly sophisticated computing technology more generally: greater efficiency and accuracy, as well as the ability to perform tasks at scales impossible for humans (think: how Google search trawls the web). In terms of risks, one breakdown proposed by Zwetsloot and Dafoe is to think in terms of risks from accidents (i.e. unintended outcomes from using AI), misuse (i.e. the deliberate use of AI to cause harm), and structural changes (i.e. how progress in AI shapes surrounding systems and dynamics). I realize this is fairly abstract, but it’s impossible to enumerate specific risks without narrowing the scope to particular application areas, time frames, and actors.

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Mineral Revenue-Sharing as Peace Dividend: Incentivizing Stakeholders to Support Peace and Stability in Afghanistan

Posted on June 26, 2021 by admin

Journal of Political Risk, Vol. 9, No. 6, June 2021

The image shows a map of Afghanistan. A satellite image of the region is contained in the map.

Mineral Map of Afghanistan. Source: USGS

Priscilla A. Tacujan, Ph.D.
Analyst for the U.S. Department of Defense

Various players have raised the prospect over the years of Afghanistan developing its mineral wealth as a means to stabilize the country, but nobody believes that it could achieve enough security to prevent attacks on infrastructure and mining operations. However, it is possible that Afghanistan might be able to broker peace and reconciliation through a mineral revenue-sharing scheme^[1] that directly distributes mining dividends and profits to the general population as well as extract concessions from the Taliban — an approach that has helped mitigate conflict in some other war-torn areas where revenue-sharing has been part of their peace accords.^[2] A trickle-down incentive structure could incentivize the Afghan people and militant groups to pursue peace and reconciliation if they become vested stakeholders and direct beneficiaries of their country’s natural resources. While security conditions in Afghanistan’s extractive industries remain a challenge, a review of successful revenue-sharing practices in other countries suggests that a similar practice in Afghanistan may yield long-term gains.

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