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PROGRAMMING NOTE: Since tomorrow is Labor Day in the US I’m going to play it by ear in terms of writing a roundup. Basically if it seems like a relatively slow news day I will hold off and double up on Tuesday.
TODAY IN HISTORY
September 5, 1905: The Russo-Japanese War ends with the signing of the Treaty of Portsmouth, negotiated with the mediation of Teddy Roosevelt (who won the 1906 Nobel Peace Prize as a result). The Russians were obliged to evacuate Manchuria, acknowledge Korea as within Japan’s sphere of influence, and turn over a couple of Pacific islands to Tokyo. The war marked Japan as a rising power and contributed to growing political discontent in Russia that wasn’t resolved until 1917.
September 5, 1972: Members of the Palestinian terror group “Black September” kill two members of the Israeli delegation and take nine more hostage during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich. A poorly handled rescue attempt at the Munich airport by West German police the following day ended with the nine hostages killed as well as five of the attackers and one police officer.
September 6, 1522: The Victoria arrives at the Spanish port of Sanlúcar, becoming the first ship to successfully circumnavigate the earth. It had set out as one of five vessels in Ferdinand Magellan’s expedition in 1519 and was the only ship to survive the journey. In that sense it fared better than its commodore, Magellan, who was killed after picking an ill-advised fight with a group of indigenous people in the Philippines. And its haul of spices in particular was worth more than the other four ships combined, so investors still came out ahead. The Victoria would fully complete its trip around the world two days later by returning to the port whence it departed, Seville.
September 6, 1955: The two-day Istanbul Pogrom begins amid news reports that the Turkish consulate in Thessaloniki (located in the former home where Turkey’s founding father, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, was born) had been bombed by Greek agents. A mob began attacking Greeks in Istanbul and then expanded its scope to include Armenians and Jews. Between 13 and 30 people are said to have been killed in the violence and the incident began a process of Greek emigration that played out over the next several years. In reality, the consulate was fine and the whole thing was a planned operation by Turkey’s two “Operation Gladio” organizations, the Tactical Mobilization Group and Counter-Guerrilla. They were responding to the rise of Greek unionist sentiment (Enosis) in Cyprus and were likely also working on a longer-term project to “encourage” minority emigration and thereby “Turkify” Turkey.
MIDDLE EAST
LEBANON
The Israeli military (IDF) killed at least seven people across southern Lebanon on Sunday, prompting Lebanese President Joseph Aoun to appeal for US assistance in reducing Israeli violence. Israeli officials insisted that they were responding to a Saturday drone strike by Hezbollah against IDF personnel positioned near the Ali al-Taher ridge.
ISRAEL-PALESTINE
The IDF killed at least two people, a man and his daughter, in Gaza on Sunday. Israeli officials claimed that they were targeting a Hamas member and said that they were investigating the airstrike.
In the West Bank, Israeli settlers killed at least one Palestinian and wounded three others in a shooting incident near the city of Qalqilya early Monday morning. Settler terrorism has been on the rise of late across the territory, shining an international spotlight on the issue. In response, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly ordered the removal of dozens of unapproved settler outposts. The order applies to upwards of 100 such facilities, which is less than a third of the total number of illegal (under Israeli law) outposts that dot the territory. Netanyahu is hoping that this fairly empty gesture will ease the pressure he’s now under from the US to rein in settler violence, without completely upsetting his base ahead of next month’s election.
YEMEN
Weekend fighting between Ansarullah and the Yemeni government’s security forces left over 140 people dead according to AFP, which reported at least 57 of the former’s fighters and 84 of the latter’s being among the dead. I haven’t seen any specifics regarding civilian casualties though at least four were killed and nine more wounded in an Ansarullah missile strike in Yemen’s Taiz province on Saturday. More than 300 people have been killed in total since Ansarullah launched a new offensive on Thursday. Government forces claimed the capture of part of Hudaydah province over the weekend, continuing a string of potentially significant advances on their part.
IRAN
The potatoes in Donald Trump’s “small potatoes” war with Iran seemed to get a little bigger on Saturday, when Iranian forces fired on at least two US naval vessels. Since the June “memorandum of understanding” that put the brakes on the much bigger potatoes phase of the war, the Iranians have tended to focus their attacks on commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz. The US military’s Central Command described Saturday’s attacks, on an aircraft carrier and a destroyer, as “unprovoked” and I mention this mostly because it belongs in the obvious gaslighting hall of fame if such a thing exists. The Iranians also claimed attacks on three oil tankers while US forces attacked three Iranian oil tankers, including one near the country’s Kharg island oil facility. Iranian assertions that the US military ships took some damage in the attacks cannot be confirmed and Central Command denied it.
On Sunday, Iranian officials claimed to have struck an “unmanned” US naval vessel in the strait, which Central Command also rejected. And US Energy Secretary Chris Wright told ABC News that the US and Iran “may not” negotiate a nuclear deal after all. Who could have predicted? I guess it doesn’t matter, because it’s not like Wright’s boss justified a whole war on the basis of reaching a nuclear deal. And the alternative to a deal is, according to Wright, simply to stay at war with Iran in perpetuity, attacking the country any time it appears to be reconstituting a nuclear program. That seems perfectly reasonable.
ASIA
MYANMAR
Myanmar junta leader Min Aung Hlaing made his first official visit to Vietnam as a nominally civilian head of state on Friday, and on Saturday he and Vietnamese President Tô Lâm announced that they had agreed to strengthen their defense and security relationship. The deal itself is less notable for what it entails than for what it says about Myanmar’s reintegration into Southeast Asian politics, now that its junta has gone through the motions of holding an election. Min Aung Hlaing’s visit in itself was a sign of normalization, and the defense agreement goes beyond that.
CHINA
The Washington Post reports on Chinese President Xi Jinping’s recently busy travel calendar, which indicates that he’s hoping to capitalize on the present geopolitical moment:
Chinese leader Xi Jinping has hit the road this September for an unusual series of diplomatic trips spanning four countries, three state visits, two multilateral summits and one widely anticipated meeting with President Donald Trump.
A key part of his agenda: A pitch for China as a stable partner, especially for developing countries, during a period of what Beijing has portrayed as U.S.-driven geopolitical uncertainty.
The visits — to Kyrgyzstan, Egypt, India and the United States — are a collective rarity for the Chinese leader, who has sharply limited his international travel since the coronavirus pandemic. Between 2021 and 2025, U.S. presidents logged 51 visits to other countries, compared to just 25 for Xi.
Other world leaders have been more than willing to visit Xi in China, allowing him the luxury of holding court at home. But experts say he now sees openings abroad.
AFRICA
SUDAN
There are several items of note:
The Sudanese military (SAF) captured the town of Hamrat al-Wiz in Sudan’s North Kordofan state on Sunday. Given its location, this could further strengthen the SAF’s control of the main road linking the Khartoum region to North Kordofan’s state capital, El Obeid.
In South Kordofan, the Sudan Doctors Network is reporting that the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North killed at least five civilians on Friday in an artillery attack on the town of Dilling.
The United Nations Panel of Experts on the Sudan has submitted a new report to the UN Security Council claiming that “commanders” within the Rapid Support Forces militant group “ordered fighters to rape women and encouraged the killing of civilians during their takeover of El Fasher,” the capital of North Darfur state, last October. The atrocities reach all the way to RSF Deputy Commander Abdel Rahim Hamdan Dagalo, brother of RSF leader Muhammad Hamdan Dagalo.
The New York Times reported on Saturday that “a dossier of evidence shared with [the NYT] by a Middle Eastern intelligence agency bolsters” US allegations that the SAF has been using chemical weapons, specifically chlorine gas. We can assume that said intelligence agency hails from either the UAE, which supports the RSF, or Israel on the UAE’s behalf. In either case that would argue for taking these claims with a heap of salt. That said, the SAF hasn’t exactly wreathed itself in glory over the past three and a half years and just because the purview of this dossier may be suspect that doesn’t make its claims false.
NIGER
Niger’s ruling junta is accusing the French government of fomenting last weekend’s mutiny/attempted coup. While this isn’t out of the question, I wouldn’t make too much of it. Nigerien officials (like their other Sahelian junta counterparts) tend to blame their misfortunes on France as a means of deflecting from their own failures by dredging up nationalist/anti-colonialist sentiment.
ETHIOPIA
Al Jazeera discusses the Tigray People’s Liberation Front’s efforts to preserve and reconstitute itself under the Pretoria Agreement that ended its 2020-2022 war against the Ethiopian government:
Nearly four years later, the large-scale war has ended, but many of the disputes that fuelled it remain unresolved.
More significantly, the period since 2024 has seen the TPLF reposition itself politically and organisationally while retaining military leverage and developing new relationships.
The sequence is striking: TPLF contacts with Eritrean officials, including reported meetings in Dubai and Zalambessa; a renewed struggle over political control in Tigray; reports of recruitment and mobilisation; new clashes involving Tigrayan forces; and the emergence of Tsimdo, a loose convergence of groups opposed to the federal government.
Taken together, the developments raise a question over whether Pretoria became less a completed transition to peace than a period in which the TPLF could regroup and reposition itself while the underlying conflict remained unresolved.
There is no evidence that the TPLF entered the agreement with a predetermined plan to use it as a tactical pause. But the events since 2024 suggest that the movement has retained an organisational and security role that Pretoria was supposed to diminish.
Tsimdo puts the TPLF in alliance with multiple groups including Fano militias from the Amhara region and the Oromo Liberation Army. The TPLF and the Fano in particular have a history of tense relations and are still at odds over which region should control the territory that is currently classified as the western portion of the Tigray region. If they can collaborate with each other and with the Eritreans, that could pose a serious threat to the Ethiopian government.
NAMIBIA
The Trump administration is “phasing out” support for Namibia’s anti-AIDS programs, allocating just $45 million for them in 2027 and nothing beyond that apart from “technical cooperation.” Namibia is one of several African countries that have balked at the administration’s demands for things like sensitive health data and favorable resource deals as prerequisites for continuing US health aid. Namibia has “surpassed UNAIDS targets,” so the effect of this funding cut will hopefully be small.
EUROPE
RUSSIA
Russian President Vladimir Putin hosted US envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff on Saturday, while Russian airstrikes were killing at least ten people across Ukraine and Ukrainian attacks killed at least two people in Russia’s Belrogod oblast. The meeting doesn’t seem to have resulted in any major breakthroughs, though as a courtesy to the envoys both countries agreed to hold off on attacking one another’s capital cities through Monday. Kushner and Witkoff headed to Kyiv on Sunday, which was their first visit to the Ukrainian capital. Again there don’t seem to have been any major developments, though even touching base at this point seems useful.
UKRAINE
The New York Times reports on the extent to which rank corruption has been undermining the Ukrainian war effort:
Confidential reviews by the State Audit Service and an internal Ministry of Defense auditing department reveal a military procurement system riddled with mismanagement. Warning signs go unheeded, the records show, and there are seldom consequences for overcharging or failing to deliver.
Companies won contracts without demonstrating that they could supply the weapons, or without licenses to deliver them. Auditors identified 18 companies that signed deals despite defaulting on previous agreements. Six of those companies failed to fulfill a single contract.
Military contractors around the globe, including the world’s richest arms dealer as well as Ukrainian and American companies, have gotten wealthy through this system.
The internal government audits showed that in 2024 alone, Ukraine lost about $1.2 billion to fraud, waste and mismanagement.
Those losses, which have not been made public, piled up even as President Volodymyr Zelensky appealed to allies for more weaponry and financial aid.
AMERICAS
COLOMBIA
Somebody carried out an attack on a Colombian military outpost in the city of Ocaña, in Colombia’s Norte de Santander department, on Friday night that killed at least three soldiers and wounded four others. Colombian authorities have pointed to National Liberation Army (ELN) rebels and the group is active in that part of the country, though as far as I know it hasn’t claimed responsibility as yet.
UNITED STATES
Finally, Responsible Statecraft’s Andrew Leonard discusses the potential parameters of US military operations in Latin America:
On Thursday, U.S. SOUTHCOM Commander Gen. Francis L. Donovan met with the Colombian and Ecuadorian defense ministers in San Lorenzo, Ecuador. The trio agreed on a plan to significantly expand their military cooperation along the Ecuador-Colombia border, moving past episodic U.S.-partnered missions and toward sustained combined operations against groups Washington has designated as terrorist organizations.
This development is significant because it occurs at the time U.S. military forces are already operating on the ground with Ecuadorian forces in Esmeraldas, with the precise manner of cooperation publicly unknown. Additionally, on Aug. 23, Colombian President Abelardo de la Espriella announced all illegal armed and criminal groups will be classified and treated strictly as “terrorists” under a new “Comprehensive Security and Public Order Strategy,” further laying the groundwork for expanded military cooperation with the U.S. and Ecuador. The new U.S.-Colombian-Ecuadorian tripartite framework and broader commitments made at the recent Americas Counter Cartel Coalition (A3C) in Panama raise an even larger question: what types of U.S. military cooperation will occur across the Americas, and under what authorities?
The framework, in deepening the integration of U.S. military forces on land, may see those forces advising foreign military forces, participating in combined operational planning, and supporting or even participating in future combined patrols and lethal strikes inside Ecuadorian and Colombian territory, and potentially elsewhere in the region.
The distinction is important because ‘security cooperation and security assistance’ can describe varying levels of activity, each governed by different authorities and with different levels of risk and consequences. U.S. military engagement with foreign security forces is best understood as four increasingly consequential forms of involvement, each with their own unique legal and political requirements and associated costs: training and equipping; advising and assisting; partner-enabled U.S. operations; and direct employment of U.S. forces.
This news digest and commentary is breath taking in its coverage and detail.