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TODAY IN HISTORY
August 27, 1883: The Krakatoa volcano erupts violently, virtually destroying the island (located in what is now Indonesia) and causing substantial loss of life. Days of volcanic activity culminated on August 27 with four explosions, each of which generated massive tsunamis and the third of which is regarded as perhaps the loudest sound in recorded history. The immediate effects of the eruption killed 36,417 people according to Dutch records. The eruption caused a volcanic winter and ejected so much sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere that it cooled (and darkened) the planet for the next five years.
August 27, 1896: Shortly after 9 AM local time, British forces invade the Zanzibar Sultanate over a succession dispute. Around 40 minutes later the Anglo-Zanzibar War was over and Britain’s man was on the throne. This conflict, the shortest war in recorded history, marks the point at which Britain’s protectorate over Zanzibar really took hold and the sultanate—founded when Zanzibar and Oman split into separate kingdoms in 1856—ceased to be an independent political entity in any meaningful sense.
MIDDLE EAST
LEBANON
The Israeli military (IDF) killed at least one person (a newlywed woman) and wounded six others in southern Lebanon’s Nabatieh province on Thursday, according to Lebanese state media. The IDF said later that it was retaliating for Hezbollah drone strikes on its personnel. It was a busy day for Israeli occupation forces, which also carried out a number of operations in southern Syria. Anecdotal reports suggest that some of those operations have been quite intense, but there’s very little detail available as yet and there may be more to say tomorrow.
ISRAEL-PALESTINE
IDF airstrikes killed at least three people in Gaza on Thursday. Israeli forces have now killed more than 1300 people under the “ceasefire” that ostensibly went into effect in October. While the IDF serially violates the ceasefire, the Israeli government is getting rid of the people who are supposed to be monitoring it. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar expelled a group of Dutch monitors from the International Gaza Support Center earlier this week (after expelling a Spanish team earlier this year), and The Financial Times reported on Thursday that he may also get rid of “British and potentially other European officials” as well. Ostensibly they’re all biased against Israel, but maybe Sa’ar is also operating under the principle that you can’t violate a ceasefire if there’s nobody around to see you do it.
IRAN
Séamus Malekafzali is skeptical about Maximum Pressure 2.0’s chances of bringing down the Iranian government:
Despite the conjured images of American gloves finally being taken off, there is little indication of what, in substance, is significantly different from other sanctions packages the Treasury has deployed against the Islamic Republic. Those with memories extending beyond the past few months may remember when the Treasury Department under Bessent announced Operation Economic Fury at the height of the war, which also targeted foreign buyers of Iranian oil, banks dealing in Iranian money, and clandestine monetary exchange networks. Those who were conscious during the first Trump administration may also remember “Maximum Pressure”, spearheaded by then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo which also attempted to strangle the country and bring about the government’s eventual collapse.
None of these initiatives worked to the full extent they intended, even when they were built upon by the Biden administration in the interregnum, that White House not only deploying multiple sanctions packages of its own but also utilizing the Department of Justice’s powers to begin seizing tankers carrying hundreds of thousands of barrels of Iranian oil. Crippling economic sanctions drove the Iranian economy into disarray, robbing Iranians of their life savings as the rial crumbled and collapsed, reaching its all-time low against the dollar just this month as Bessent has proudly touted. The shattered economy has, however, not led to the collapse of the government, nor substantially changed its behavior abroad.
Elsewhere:
Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani (who also serves as foreign minister) traveled to Iran on Thursday. He’s the second senior official from a would-be mediating country to make that trip this week, after Pakistani military boss Asim Munir. It’s hard to know whether this flurry of diplomacy reflects actual progress or just a strong desire on the part of those countries to try to manufacture some progress. My guess is the latter. Iranian Supreme National Security Council Secretary Mohsen Rezaee told a Lebanese outlet on Thursday that the mediators have asked Tehran to prepare a list of “conditions” for the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, which suggests that any negotiations are still at a very preliminary stage.
Rezaee also denied reports that the Iranian government has put a $10 million bounty on the head of Donald Trump’s son, Barron. Those reports are based on a video that reportedly ran on Iranian state television, which is a detail that I don’t think Rezaee attempted to explain.
ASIA
INDIA
At Foreign Affairs, C. Raja Mohan believes that the Indian government has decided to put up with Donald Trump for the time being, but that may not last forever:
President Donald Trump, in his second term, has severely tested the U.S.-Indian relationship. He has slapped tariffs on India, threatened to impose secondary sanctions, gotten considerably closer to Pakistan, and enthusiastically engaged with China—the country India considers its biggest long-term military threat. Yet these strains have not led to the rupture that some observers had predicted. Nor have they forced a fundamental reorientation of Indian foreign policy. Instead, New Delhi has adopted what might be called an “America plus” strategy, in which it seeks to sustain partnership with the United States while widening its engagement with other powers, namely U.S. allies.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has responded with unusual restraint to Trump’s provocations and has resisted demands to pull away from Washington. With the United States, India has continued trade negotiations, increased defense cooperation, and expanded technological and commercial ties. In addition, he has sustained the Quad, a regional security organization that also includes Australia, Japan, and the United States; drawn closer to U.S. allies; preserved relations with Russia; and sought to lower tensions with China. These efforts do not represent a retreat from the United States or a strategy of multialignment. India is trying to reduce its exposure to American volatility, but it still recognizes that Washington is its most important partner.
After all, when it comes to cultivating a great-power patron, India doesn’t have better options. China and Russia will never buy Indian goods and services on the scale that the United States does, nor can Russia help India balance China. These realities have protected the U.S.-Indian relationship so far. But if Trump continues to bully India, public opinion could force Modi to abandon his restrained approach.
MYANMAR
At Foreign Policy, Kristina Kironska and Jan-Sha write that the rare earth industry in Myanmar has survived and even thrived despite the chaos of that country’s ongoing civil war. The costs, in the form of little to no environmental, labor, or human rights protections, are borne mainly by ordinary people:
Communities living near mining areas bear the brunt. They face exposure to contaminated water, polluted soil, and unsafe working conditions. Workers frequently perform hazardous tasks involving toxic chemicals for low wages and with little or no protective equipment, and cases of sexual exploitation involving women workers have also been widely reported. Accountability mechanisms are weak or entirely absent. Local communities bear the long-term environmental costs while Chinese investors capture most of the profits.
These consequences are not unique to rare earths. The Letpadaung copper mine, for example, became associated with violent crackdowns on protesters, forced evictions, and allegations that local communities bore the environmental and social costs while military-linked and foreign actors captured most of the economic gains. However, conflict and fragmented authority can deepen these risks by dispersing the responsibility among multiple actors, making it unclear who is responsible for enforcing standards and compensating affected local communities.
Myanmar exposes one of the central contradictions of the global energy transition. The technologies meant to power a greener and more sustainable future are frequently built on extraction systems embedded within civil war, fragmented governance, environmental destruction, and coercive political economies.
AFRICA
SUDAN
According to The Sudan Tribune, the Sudanese military (SAF) “repelled an attack” by the Rapid Support Forces militant group on a town in southeastern Sudan’s Blue Nile state on Thursday, killing “dozens” of the group’s fighters. The town, Al-Keli, is located along the Ethiopian border near Kurmuk, which the SAF retook from the RSF last month.
SOUTH SUDAN
Rustlers killed at least 49 people and wounded 33 more when they attacked a cattle camp and village in South Sudan’s Warrap state on Thursday. I note this incident partly for the high casualty figure but also because it’s only the second-deadliest such incident in Warrap state this month—a coordinated assault on a camp and nearby village left at least 60 people dead and 50 more wounded back on August 9. Both of these attacks have taken place in Warrap’s Tonj North County region and the rustlers appear to have come from neighboring Unity State.
SOMALIA
Data from the International Maritime Organization, analyzed by AFP, shows that piracy in the waters off the coast of Somalia has reached 2013 levels, with at least 15 cases reported so far this year. Eight of those have taken place just since May. For reference there were five instances of piracy in these waters throughout all of last year. The Iran war and the resumption of conflict in Yemen appear to be driving this resurgence in piracy.
UGANDA
The good news is that the World Health Organization has declared Uganda’s Ebola outbreak over, with no new cases detected there for the past 42 days. There is still some risk of new cases entering Uganda from the neighboring Democratic Republic of the Congo but that doesn’t diminish the significance of this announcement.
The bad news is that, as AFP reports, Uganda is approaching what could be a serious struggle to determine who will succeed 81 year old President Yoweri Museveni, who’s ruled the country since 1986. Muhoozi Kainerugaba, who is the commander of the Ugandan military and Museveni’s son, is clearly intent on taking over and has already declared his candidacy in Uganda’s 2031 presidential election (though if Museveni is still around and interested in keeping his job at that time then Kainerugaba will presumably stand down). But there is growing support for Odrek Rwabwogo, who is married to Museveni’s daughter, has a business background, and in marked contrast to Kainerugaba is not (as far as anybody knows) a sadist. He’s trying to present himself as a less volatile alternative. Kainerugaba has begun threatening to arrest Rwabwogo and his associates so this situation is already becoming dangerous and Museveni hasn’t even gone anywhere yet.
EUROPE
NATO
Reuters reported on Thursday that the US Defense Department is aiming to complete its review of the US military posture in Europe by November 6, about a month ahead of schedule. It’s aiming to offer Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth “at least four sets of options” for reducing that posture, which aligns with Donald Trump’s desire to put a greater share of the burden of supporting NATO on its European members and with his anger that those European members didn’t join the Iran war to whatever degree Trump demanded. The Trump administration has reportedly circulated a questionnaire among NATO’s European members as part of this review that includes items related to “any restrictions” that they’ve placed on the US military’s “access, basing, and overflight” rights and “regulations or other measures designed to inhibit or reduce transatlantic defense industrial cooperation.”
Speaking of NATO and the Iran war, the US military is now facing a “beyond critical” shortage in the number of available Patriot air defense interceptors it has stationed in Europe. The Pentagon has been shifting interceptors to the Middle East from around the world because of the war. This could be a critical situation if Russia, or some other actor, decided to start firing missiles at parts of Europe in the near future, but that doesn’t seem terribly likely.
RUSSIA
An apparent car bomb killed a lieutenant colonel in the Russian military and wounded his wife in St. Petersburg on Thursday. There’s no indication as to culpability but Russian authorities have unsurprisingly accused the Ukrainian government of similar previous attacks on senior military personnel.
UKRAINE
The Russian military carried out what it called a “massive” overnight bombardment across Ukraine, targeting no fewer than nine cities including Kyiv and killing at least one person while wounding another 15. While Russian officials insisted that all of their targets were military-related it would appear that a number of residential buildings and other civilian facilities were hit.
AMERICAS
VENEZUELA
Axios reported on Thursday that “the Trump administration is in talks with Venezuela's interim government about taking an ownership stake in the South American country's enormous oil resources.” It would apparently involve “more than a dozen productive oil fields” but would not cover all of Venezuela’s oil reserves. In return for submitting itself to this colony-esque arrangement, the Venezuelan government (such as it is) “would benefit from private companies, including American firms, developing the fields and returning more oil revenue to that country.”
UNITED STATES
Finally, The Guardian reports on the financial impact that the Iran war has had on the US Navy:
Donald Trump’s war on Iran has driven the US military into a severe financial crisis, with the US navy forced to transfer money from its payroll and other sources to cover the costs of combat, according to documents obtained by the Guardian, and interviews with navy officials, contractors and defense analysts.
The US-Israeli operation, which has depleted US munitions stockpiles and prompted retaliatory Iranian strikes that have wrecked strategic bases across the Middle East, is piling pressure on budgets across the military.
One Pentagon memo about navy funding seen by the Guardian warns that there are “shortfalls in payroll” accounts due to the department “raiding” them to fund combat operations.
Experts and former officials say the accounts are running dry. “The piggy bank is broken,” said Harlan Ullman, a retired naval officer. Ullman is a member of the National Commission for the Future of the Navy but he said he is not speaking on the commission’s behalf.
One official and one navy contractor said non-emergency maintenance on shore-based facilities has been deferred because of the cash crunch.