Iskander Rehman
Senior Political Scientist at the RAND Corporation. Applied history, grand strategy and Asian security.
- The best post-crisis analysis I have read so far--with a particularly useful discussion of what "the combination of new norms on attribution, the precedents set by provocative targeting, the chaotic information warfare environment, and new drone technologies" mean for future India-Pakistan crises.
- This article is well worth a read. @gesineweber.bsky.social has rapidly emerged as one of the most probing, knowledgeable and nuanced analysts of French and European security.
- "Between 2010 & 2019, 🇨🇳 & 🇷🇺 scientists jointly published fewer than 300 English-language papers on topics related to artificial intelligence—far less than the output of joint 🇺🇸-🇨🇳 research collaboration." One interesting nugget among many in this excellent report. www.cnas.org/press/press-...
- Honored by this generous review by @lindsaypowell.bsky.social of my book “Iron Imperator” in @warontherocks.bsky.social (1/12) warontherocks.com/2025/05/reth...
-
View full threadAnd finally, I would be remiss if I didn't mention the fact that the Office of Net Assessment (ONA) sponsored much of the research that went into this book. Over the decades, ONA remained one of the few institutions with an appreciation for the value of granularly conducted military history.(11/12)
- ...Along with an awareness of the need to broaden our collective aperture, and move beyond the most familiar (and oft overworn) historical case studies of great power competition in order to gain a better intellectual purchase on our complex present. (12/12)
- Finally, for those wishing to further whet their appetite, you can check out the book’s thoughtful and elegantly framed foreword by the renowned British classicist Sir Peter Stothard here…(9/12)
- ..and here…You can also purchase the audiobook version (brilliantly narrated by Malk Williams) on Spotify, Apple and other similar platforms open.spotify.com/show/3XSXF2Z... (10/12)
- By the good folks at The Hague Center for Strategic Studies: (7/12) hcss.nl/news/hcss-ch...
- And for podcast aficionados you can check out this conversation with the always excellent Aaron MacLean on School of War: (8/12) podcasts.apple.com/ru/podcast/e...
- In The National Review: (5/12) www.nationalreview.com/magazine/202...
- In The New Criterion: (6/12) newcriterion.com/dispatch/the...
- I’ve been fortunate—the 2023 meme appears to have been quite accurate. A lot of people do, indeed, seem to want to think quite frequently about the Roman Empire—especially those with an interest in strategy & policymaking. www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/20... Some additional reviews below: (3/12)
- In The Critic: (4/12) thecritic.co.uk/a-commanding...
- Powell is a top-notch military historian whose work on ancient military strategy I’ve been devouring for years. His own biography of Tiberius is about to get released and promises to be a must-read. Make sure you get a copy: (2/12) www.amazon.com/Tiberius-Mas...
- On this day, thinking of my Franco-British grandfather, Major Peter Fawcett of the King’s African Rifles, who also served as liaison officer with the the Free French, and of my Norman great-grandparents, Hippolyte and Marcelline Durand, who served in the French resistance.
- Also remembering Great-Uncle Victor, Hippolyte’s brother—also in the resistance, and who died in a German concentration camp.
- Hard to think of a more riveting location for the military historian than the isle of Malta. Already plotting at least two longform essays on different aspects of this doughty island’s fabled military history.
- “Taiwan imported about 70% of the calories its people ate in 2023, but is largely self-sufficient in rice, vegetables, fruit & seafood. It has stockpiled about 7 months’ worth of rice and 12 months of meat. There are contingency plans for instant noodles.” economist.com/briefing/202...
- "Modeling (America's AGI) approach on the broader Apollo program would provide a better template for whole-of-society competition, ensuring U.S. safety, security, and prosperity." A smart, nuanced piece of analysis by RAND colleague Matt Chessen & Craig Martell.
- "Gold and green are the fields in peace, red are the fields in war, black are the fields when the cannons cease, and white forevermore." The Pulitzer-prize-winning dean of American cartoonists, John McCutcheon, in the Chicago Tribune, August 1914.
- Excellent piece in @foreignaffairs.com by @ldfreedman.bsky.social on a topic dear to my heart: protracted warfare: www.foreignaffairs.com/age-forever-...
- One of the most interesting (and perhaps still somewhat under-examined) ramifications of the war in Ukraine--the growing strategic convergence between Asian & European democracies, and the sizable role now played by the ROK's defense industry in Europe. breakingdefense.com/2025/04/sout...
- “Ironically, the only thing Taiwan has enough of are generals and admirals: 308 to be exact. The ratio of general and flag officers to servicemembers is approximately 2.5 times higher than that found in the U.S. military.”
- Very much looking forward to reading this.
- In the last couple of years I've become increasingly worried India is not doing enough to deter China and to prepare to defeat China in a war if deterrence fails. I present my concerns in a new journal article out today in the Journal of Strategic Studies. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
- Great piece. I'd add that the 1978 animated film is a dark masterpiece which, as a child, I found both enthralling and chilling in equal measure.
- "To achieve scale, Washington must transform its alliance architecture from a collection of managed relationships to a platform for integrated & pooled capacity building across the military, economic, & technological domains." Excellent and timely piece: www.foreignaffairs.com/china/undere...
- Excellent, bipartisan set of papers on US-China technology competition published by the @pellcenter.bsky.social : www.pellcenter.org/the-project-...
- Very much looking forward to reading the new essays in the most recent Washington Quarterly--especially @sheenagreitens.bsky.social 's reflections on protracted warfare, & Toshi Yoshihara and Evan Montgomery's analysis of China's coercive options vis a vis Taiwan twq.elliott.gwu.edu
- “A wise king is not less a father of those subjects who shall live at the distance of three or four generations, than of those who live in his own time.” The Duke of Sully cautioning against the lure of quick fixes & stressing the importance of longer-term grand strategy archive.org/details/memo...
- [Not loaded yet]
- Happens to be longstanding tradition in New Orleans: www.southernliving.com/food/what-is...
- “Everything has become part of the marmalade upon which, at the bidding of President Wilson, we construct a new edifice with no foundations other than useless abstractions.” A growingly frustrated French Ambassador (Paul Cambon) in 1919. Turn of the century diplomats had the best turns of phrase.
- I had never seen these haunting photos by Lewis Hine. Remarkable. www.theatlantic.com/photo/2018/0...
- A rigorous, nuanced piece of analysis by @jjjcameron.bsky.social
- "This is a difficult call for the Ministry of Defence, trying to balance cost, availability and capability. In a straight choice between the Typhoon and the Lightning, it has probably made the correct decision. But the timing could hardly be worse." www.spectator.co.uk/article/is-t...
- There is a lot that can be said about this tour de force reporting from @nytimes.com on US military involvement in Ukraine since Russia's brutal invasion. One thing, in particular, however did jump out to me when reading about the failed 2023 counteroffensive (1/9) www.nytimes.com/interactive/...
-
View full thread"Such a change, if it is to be successfully initiated and then followed by that forward movement without which there can be no victory, requires minute preparation." In short, these are eminently challenging, and morally fraught decisions..(8/9). www.amazon.com/Memoirs-Mars...
- ...made all the more difficult by the severely compressed windows of time in which they are made to unfurl... In that sense, little has changed in the fundamental character of war. (9/9)
- Correctly identifying that “kairotic moment” and deciding to transition from a strategy of attrition to one of annihilation, or of entrenchment to one of movement, has always been a deeply risk-laden decision, and therefore frequently controversial. (6/9) www.jstor.org/stable/27902...
- As Marshal Foch wrote in his memoirs, "changing in the face of the enemy from the defensive to the offensive was one of the most delicate of all decisions, presenting, in view of the vast effectives of modern armies, a most exceptional difficulty of execution." (7/9)
- "The supreme art of military leadership consists in accurately diagnosing the exact moment “opportunity offers,” i.e., when that momentous change in techniques, tactics, and procedures are most urgently required." (4/9)
- The Ancient Greeks had a specific word for this: kairos, a term distinct from the more familiar chronos and which, by characterizing that precious and elusive sense of propitiousness — either in war, athletics, or rhetoric — marked the quality of a moment in time rather than its quantity. (5/9)
- ...And that is the degree to which all of the knottiest decisions in protracted war are intricately tied to questions of timing and opportunity, in addition to resource adjudication... I wrote about this back in the fall through the prism of Vegetius: (2/9) warontherocks.com/2024/10/attr...
- Our desire to distinguish neatly between strategies of attrition & annihilation is satisfying but in fine often overly simplistic. "There is thus a time & place for entrenchment, a time & place for maneuver, a time & place for artful shadowboxing, & a time and a place for brutish collision." (3/9)
- Well it would seem this will indeed the cover for my next book on Sully, Richelieu & Mazarin. Due next year. In the meantime, given the nature of my day job at RAND, I'll be spending a lot of my weekends over the next few months deeply immersed in the bloody first half of the seventeenth century.
- "ROK intelligence suggests if North Korea’s rate of export continues, it could affect its ability to sustain a conflict on the Korean Peninsula. In other words, North Korea is potentially compromising its own military readiness to support Russia’s needs." A must-read on the DPRK's role in Ukraine.
- This should be Taiwan's goal too.
- [Not loaded yet]
-
View full threadCardinal Richelieu at the siege of la Rochelle, and Mazarin (then a young papal envoy) riding in-between the Spanish and French armies in a desperate bid to prevent further bloodshed at the battle of Casale.
- And then, perhaps my favorite, a distraught young Louis XIV at the deathbed of his mentor, godfather, and substitute father, Cardinal Mazarin.
- Along with more or less historically accurate Renaissance-style paintings of key episodes in each statesman's life--for example Sully's commanding of an artillery detachment at the battle of Coutras, or riding into battle wth Henri IV at Ivry.
