Commentary
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Our commentary partners will help you reach your own conclusions on complex topics.
Armed drone attack on oil tanker sign of challenging times in transport
He resigned coming to you from Houston and overnight us time a drone hit an oil tanker off the coast of Oman, it was several 100 miles out to sea. This is the sort of thing we should better get used to. The Iranians are in the process with a little bit of help from sales to the Russians, of putting some of their long range drones into mass production. Now, from a ship point of view, they’re not hugely dangerous, because they cannot carry a very large warhead. So one hit from one of these things, five hits from one of these things is not going to take a supertanker down. But the Iranians have proven that they’re relatively inexpensive to build less than a small car. And they can send them out in waves. Also, most oil tankers unless they’re trying to avoid sanctions have transponders and so civilians can track them. And it’s very easy for the Iranians or anyone else, for that matter, to send a small fleet in order to strike any shipping. And even if they don’t take the ship down, it’s going to force tankers to go faster, have lighter loads that are higher in the water, and in general, just have a bad time of things. Two problems come from this number one, the range of these drones is in excess of 1000 miles. So that puts everything in the Persian Gulf and a lot of the Gulf of Oman in in radian range. And you can imagine any other constraint waterway on the planet and bad actors, whether they’re governments or otherwise, deciding that they want to interoperate energy flows, that’s just something that’s going to be part of the picture moving forward. Second, the US Navy has largely gone from the region, we only have carriers in the Gulf intermittently and very soon CENTCOM headquarters and gutter are going to be closed down. And aside from a few dozen troops that we have in Syria of special forces, there really isn’t an American military presence any longer, and there isn’t going to be one for the foreseeable future, the Americans are done. And the local countries are just not capable of dealing with this on the road. Which leads us to three, the future of maritime shipping is one where the shipping companies themselves the integral ships and captains themselves are going to have to arm themselves. In some cases. This means having some Marines on board, private Marines of course, in order to prevent boardings in some cases, it means you’re going to have small arms on the surface, or sorry, on the top of the ship in order to shoot down things that are coming in and maybe even some missile systems, which are becoming cheaper and cheaper by the day or their own drone systems in order to interdict attacks coming in. All of this is going to slow down shipping, and it’s going to raise the costs and make it more and more and more difficult to engage in any sort of long term, long range maritime shipping. The part of the world that is going to suffer the most from this by far is Asia where you’ve got lots and lots and lots of giant tankers going all the time and lots and lots of lots of intermediate supply chain steps for manufacturing. That is where the vast majority of the world’s shipping is on any given day and it is all vulnerable.
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French troops moving into Ukraine could shake up Europe
At the outset of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, French President Emmanuel Macron pursued a diplomatic resolution to the conflict. Recently, with the war still dragging on, Macron has adopted a far more hawkish position. On Tuesday, March 19, the commander of the French ground forces stated that his troops are prepared for deployment, indicating…
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Drones are revolutionizing modern warfare
Military technology has evolved rapidly since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Drone technology, specifically, has emerged as a decisive new factor in modern warfare. Straight Arrow News contributor Peter Zeihan reviews the use of drones in the Russia-Ukraine war to understand how warfare itself is evolving today. The recent Ukrainian drone attacks…
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Are Japan’s rising interest rates signaling a return to normal?
Japan raised interest rates for the first time since 2007 from -0.1% to a range of 0%- 0.1%, ending an era of negative interest rates that was initiated years ago to help stimulate its struggling economy. The move came in response to rising inflation and wages. Straight Arrow News contributor Peter Zeihan argues that while…
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Deflation, not inflation, is the real economic risk
Over the past two years, concern over global inflation has made news headlines in every developed economy around the world. But the opposite risk — deflation — can also devastate modern economies. Straight Arrow News contributor Peter Zeihan is actually more concerned about deflation than inflation. Zeihan explains that while inflation can be self-regulating, deflation…
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How populations determine economic growth
Demographic momentum, roughly understood as a population’s ability to grow its economy over generations, is a key determinant for forecasting economic progress. For instance, the continent of Africa has mostly positive demographic momentum because the average age of the population is very young and can be expected to produce more and more wealth in the…
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Popular Opinions
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In addition to the facts, we believe it’s vital to hear perspectives from all sides of the political spectrum. We hope these different voices will help you reach your own conclusions.
The opinions published in this section are solely those of the contributors and do not reflect the views of Straight Arrow News.
Latest Commentary
We know it is important to hear from a diverse range of observers on the complex topics we face and believe our commentary partners will help you reach your own conclusions.
The commentaries published in this section are solely those of the contributors and do not reflect the views of Straight Arrow News.
Peter Zeihan
Geopolitical StrategistDrones are revolutionizing modern warfare
Are Japan’s rising interest rates signaling a return to normal?
Deflation, not inflation, is the real economic risk
Dr. Frank Luntz
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Pete Ricketts
U.S. Senator for Nebraska