So what exactly happened with the allegedly Russian-orchestrated DDOS attack on Estonian Internet interests? Some people have been talking about the first act of “cyberwar” against a sovereign state, others about a bizarre fuss about nothing. AFOE asked Gadi Evron, a world expert on botnets who runs Israel’s CERT and who took part in the [...]

Everyone’s now blogged about Jacques Chirac’s unexpected remarks about Iranian nuclear weapons.
But I think there may still be some angular momentum to be had. Chirac stated that, should a hypothetically nuclear Iran launch a nuclear weapon, Tehran would be destroyed before it had gone 200 metres. This is a pretty basic statement of nuclear deterrence, [...]

Getting away from the eternal baboon threat displays and absurd disinformation for a moment, what do we know about EU and US defence? The lazy/cowardly/decadent/anti-imperialist Euros refuse to do anything, spend any money, or fight, and the US is permanently and increasingly stronger, right? Let’s see what the professionals think. The latest issue of Parameters, [...]

For some reason, there is hardly ever any NATO coverage on this blog, despite the fact it’s the other pan-European institution. The Euro-Atlantic alliance is having a summit next month, to be held in Riga. Now, one of the main topics for this gathering is the long-running one of adapting NATO to challenges other than [...]

This anniversary guest post was written by the indispensable Jérôme Guillet, who normally writes for The European Tribune.
Laurence Parisot, the head of MEDEF, the French business
organisation, recently complained that:

There is one word who meaning for the public has changed in the past 25 years: “reform”. It used to be synonymous with progress, and now it [...]

So the latest round of talks on Kosovo begin in Vienna today.
There have already been seven rounds of talks since February. The result: the two sides have utterly failed to reach any agreement on anything whatsoever.
But this is not just an eighth round. No, this is a new “phase” of the talks. [...]

Before moving in to the nitty-gritty of flexicurity; what it is and whether it can work as a universal European labour market model I should take the time to thank the AFOE team for allowing me a spell as a guest-writer here at the blog in the coming two weeks. In terms of presentation my [...]

The day is approaching fast (likely the release date of Microsoft’s next version of its Windows operating system, called Windows Vista) on which a so-called trusted platform module on your computer’s motherboard will be able bar you from accessing the data on your computer, or at least bar you from doing with it what you [...]

The Netherlands is talking about sending an additional 1,200 troops to Afghanistan’s Uruzgan province. The Dutch already have 540 people working in Afghanistan under the umbrella of the ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) peace mission and another 674 under the umbrella of Operation Enduring Freedom. For other Dutch international deployments look here.
Why is it hard [...]

Leafing through the comments on Brussels Gonzo’s last post, I can’t help getting the feeling that this news about Iran’s decision to resume its nuclear programme may well serve to focus our energy debate a little.
Britain yesterday vowed to report Iran to the United Nations Security Council, intensifying diplomatic pressure over Tehran’s nuclear [...]