Articles by: Amin Saikal

Author Biography:

Amin Saikal is Emeritus Professor of Middle Eastern and Central Asian Studies at the Australian National University and Adjunct Professor of Social Sciences at the University of Western Australia, and the author of forthcoming book How to Lose a War: The Story of America’s Intervention in Afghanistan, published by Yale University Press.

Imperial Fiasco: Half a century of failed US adventures, from Vietnam, to Afghanistan

In each case, the US president of the time advanced an ideological and geopolitical justification for America’s involvement and claimed a kind of victory.

Threats and Conflict in the Middle East

Israel’s status as a nuclear state means that the threat of nuclear proliferation is constant.

Lebanon’s Predicament

Lebanon is in the grip of long-term instability that threatens its viability as a functioning state. This instability can only be addressed if its internal political system is fundamentally reformed and decoupled from outside powers’ interference in pursuit of conflicting regional geopolitical interests.

American–Iranian Enmity

Trump’s regional strategies are being undermined by Iran’s new alliances

Informit: American-Iranian enmity

Trump's regional strategies are being undermined by Iran's new alliances.

Regional Inferno

The turbulent state of the Middle East

Informit: Regional inferno

The turbulent state of the Middle East The Middle East is on the boil more than could have been expected a decade ago. It has been transformed into a zone of conflicts within conflicts, which have bedevilled the region from Afghanistan to Syria to Palestine to Yemen to Libya. It has gained the notorious reputation of being the most unstable, turbulent and insecure region of the world. Authoritarianism, violent extremism, human rights violations, social and…

Informit: Balance of power

The oil-rich but volatile Muslim Middle East, including North Africa, is falling apart. It is in the grip of multiple humanitarian and geopolitical crises and balance-of-power shifts, of a scale perhaps not seen since the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire and the British- French colonial remapping of the region nearly a century ago. The old correlation of forces in support of maintaining the status quo, especially following the 1978-79 Iranian revolution, is altering. A set…