The Commonwealth is entering a period of geopolitical struggle with NATO and the United States for control over the territory of the erstwhile Soviet Union and nearby countries. The Alliance mounted an energetic campaign to enlist the services of post- Soviet republics in performance of its own military-political missions in the region. Russia’s geopolitical interests are in danger. Outperformed at every turn, the international structures it established in the region (CIS Collective Security Treaty Organization or CSTO and Shanghai Cooperation Organization) become virtual.

Exercise Peace Mission’2010 of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization is to be launched in Kazakhstan on September 10. There appear to be no particular reason to run the exercise save for the necessity to show that the Shanghai Cooperation Organization is still there.

The most interesting aspect of the news that there are CIA agents in the Afghan government is how quickly the story died in the media, when by all rights it should have prompted a month-long scandal.

Needless to say, Washington doesn’t care much about Afghanistan these days. Over the weekend, American conservatives staged quite a demonstration against President Barack Obama in the center of Washington, while Obama was busy preparing a powerful speech on the principles of U.S. foreign policy and the end of the U.S. occupation of Iraq, or at least the withdrawal of U.S. troops. In November, Obama and his Democratic Party are going to lose the midterm elections, and Obama’s hands will be tied by a much more hostile Congress. This is enough news to bury the story about the CIA for good.

Those who advocate a reduced global American military presence are often accused by defenders of the status quo of somehow being naïve or unable to see the big picture. But the exact opposite is true — it is those who insist America must be everywhere at all times who are also all over the place in their logic, as their advocating for perpetual war continues to lead to permanent disaster.

Take Iraq. Now that Obama has announced his own «Mission Accomplished» and is reducing troop levels, Democrats are praising the president’s leadership and Republicans are touting the Bush surge that made it all possible. But however stable or unstable Iraq becomes in the years ahead, what, exactly, did the United States get out of this war? Did any of the reasons Americans were given for invading Iraq — that Saddam Hussein was a «threat,» that he possessed weapons of mass destruction, that he aided terrorists and was somehow connected to 9/11 — turn out to be true?

Don Quixote is famous for attacking windmills that he imagines are giants. Stephen Harper and Peter MacKay have been tilting at make-believe enemies too, in the form of Russian planes in international airspace.

Last Wednesday, Harper’s communications director sent an email to journalists informing them that a pair of Tupolev TU-95 bombers had been intercepted by Canadian CF-18s some 30 nautical miles (56 kilometres) from our Arctic coastline.

«Thanks to the rapid response of the Canadian Forces,» Dimitri Soudas wrote, «at no time did the Russian aircraft enter sovereign Canadian airspace.»

Russian tactical nuclear weapons became a major political factor in the process of ratification of the START treaty under way in Russia and the United States. Barack Obama’s Administration keeps telling the U.S. Congress that the treaty ought to be ratified because without it the chances to begin tactical nuclear arms reduction talks with Moscow are infinitesimal. (Russia is believed to have nearly 4,000 tactical nuclear weapons in its arsenals.) The Pentagon itself has four hundred B61 bombs on eight NATO bases in Belgium, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Turkey, and Great Britain.

«It’s the best plane ... and when you are a pilot staring down on Russian long-range bombers, that’s an important fact to remember.»

You could be forgiven for thinking this is a quote by Tom Cruise’s Maverick character from the Cold War-era favourite Top Gun. But no, the comment was made by the Prime Minister’s director of communications after two CF-18 Hornets shadowed two Russian TU-95 Bears in the Far North on Tuesday.

Apparently miffed that the Russians had dared buzz Canadian airspace while his boss is in the Arctic, Dimitri Soudas was extolling the virtues of Canada’s fighter jets. The fact is, the Russians regularly sniff around in the North and the only reason we know about it this time, one suspects, is because the parliamentary National Defence committee was set to meet to debate the $16-billion untendered purchase of the next generation of fighter jets, the F-35s, from Lockheed Martin.

Last Saturday, Iran saw the physical startup of the first power generating unit of the Bushehr nuclear power plant. This never-ending construction project has long become the talk of the town, brought up anytime the Iranian nuclear program is discussed. It is finally nearing completion in a highly complicated political environment.

Russian-Iranian cooperation began in the 1990s, when Iran was ruled by liberals led by Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani, the country’s richest tycoon and an implacable and vindictive rival of conservative leader Sayyed Ali Khamenei (the successor of Ayatollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic republic).

As thousands of American troops prepare to return from a war zone, there could be many ugly and unexpected consequences. Multiple deployments and insufficient treatment has led some recent vets to end up on the street.

In San Diego, California, thousands of vets from the Afghanistan and Iraq wars are sleeping on the streets.

«F-ed by the government and still no treason,» said Navy veteran Brian Little. «I don’t think they show enough respect to their local veterans.»

A new era of circumpolar security is unfolding. Canadian, American and Danish warships are in the final week of a joint exercise in the Canadian Arctic, part of an annual event known as Operation Nanook. While defence officials are quick to point out they see no military threat to the region, it’s still interesting to see these three Arctic friends coming together to improve their naval combat capability in the Far North (something they didn’t do during the Cold War), a demonstration of force and solidarity to show the world they’re serious about protecting this region.

In loading rods containing 80 tonnes of low-enriched uranium fuel into the 1000-megawatt light-water reactor at Bushehr, Russia’s state-owned Rosatom nuclear corporation is launching Iran into an elite rank of countries possessing a civilian nuclear energy programme. But although Moscow’s move will likely result in Bushehr generating nuclear power by the end of this year, much of the considerable media criticism heaped on the move is in fact misplaced.

The fact is Iran won’t use the Bushehr nuclear reactor to manufacture nuclear weapons and at this point, the plant’s imminent start-up will contribute little to any ambitions Tehran might have in this regard. While the reactor’s operation will certainly enhance Iranians’ nuclear knowledge and experience, the real problem lies elsewhere—in Iran’s indigenous fuel-making activities, its unsafeguarded nuclear plants, and the likely existence of secret nuclear sites in Iran not under foreign supervision.