US Archives – ITSS Verona

December 11, 2025 — No Comments

The U.S. pressure and the Venezuela–Colombia Connection

By Giovanni Giacalone - Central and South America Desk

On October 24, 2025, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned the President of Colombia Gustavo Petro, his wife, his son, and Petro’s close associate, Armando Benedetti, over accusations of involvement in the global drug trade.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement. “Petro has allowed drug cartels to flourish and refused to stop this activity…President Trump is taking strong action to protect our nation and make clear that we will not tolerate the trafficking of drugs into our nation.”

Following the sanctions announcement, Petro named an attorney and stated that he will battle the measure taken by Washington. The Colombian President also praised his approach to countering narcotics: “Combating drug trafficking effectively for decades brings me this measure from the government of the society we helped so much to stop its use of cocaine…Quite a paradox, but not one step back and never on our knees.”

In September, the United States added Colombia to a list of countries failing to cooperate in the war on drugs, for the first time since the Pablo Escobar era.

Gustavo Petro, a former far-left guerrilla leader, claims that his counter-narcotics policy is utilizing a non-repressive approach that prioritises reaching agreements with coca leaf farmers in order to convince them to cultivate other types of crops while, at the same time, using law enforcement to hunt down drug dealers.

However, according to UN data from the Office on Drugs and Crime, the amount of land dedicated to coca cultivation has almost tripled in the past decade to a record 253,000 hectares (625,000 acres) in 2023. Colombia provides around 90% of the cocaine that is sold every year in the U.S.

The Cartel de los Soles

While the Colombian President is accused of failing to cooperate in the drug war, with Colombia being the primary cocaine provider, Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro and his close associates are accused by the U.S. of leading the drug distribution network through the Cartel de los Soles, transporting the merchandise to Mexico, the final distributor.

In July 2025, the US Treasury Department sanctioned Maduro (indicated as the leader of the Cartel), Venezuelan Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez, and Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello Rondon. Other senior regime figures had already been blacklisted in 2020. President Trump has also placed a bounty on Maduro’s head, offering $US50 million for information leading to his arrest.

A drug trafficking organisation formed by high-ranking members of the Venezuelan state and armed forces, the Cartel de los Soles emerged in 1993, when two National Guard generals were investigated for drug trafficking. As brigade commanders, they wore a sun as their insignia, hence the name "Cartel de los Soles." Initially, the group was called "Grupo Fenix," and consisted primarily of majors, colonels, and lower-ranking military personnel. Over time, however, senior officers began to enter the fray, taking control of the trafficking ring and eliminating the lower ranks. The Cartel de los Soles was designated by the Trump administration as a “Foreign Terrorist Organisation” in November 2025.

The weak Petro-Maduro political alliance

In August 2025, after the sanctions imposed by Washington on Maduro and his associates, Colombian President Gustavo Petro expressed his support for the Venezuelan leader, claiming that “Colombia and Venezuela are the same people, the same flag, the same history” and that “any military operation that is not approved by our sister countries is an aggression against Latin America and the Caribbean.” Petro also referred to Simon Bolivar’s call “freedom or death,” further revealing his attempt to bring Colombia closer to Venezuela.

Since being elected president of Colombia in August 2022, Gustavo Petro has gradually sought to distance the country from Western alliances and position himself alongside Maduro and the Bolivarian Alliance. This shift is unsurprising given his past as a member of the M-19, a far-left armed group founded in the 1970s and inspired by the Uruguayan Tupamaros and the Argentine Montoneros. At its height in the mid-1980s, the M-19 was the second largest armed group in Colombia, after the FARC, with the number of active members estimated at between 1,500 and 2,000. The M-19 demobilised in the late 1980s and transitioned to electoral politics.

Former Colombian Defense Minister Juan Carlos Pinzon recently urged the U.S Presidency not to cut off all counter-narcotics aid to Colombia and hike tariffs, because this would affect the Colombian population as well as the military and law enforcement still operating on the frontline against narco-terrorism.

Pinzon instead suggested implementing sanctions against specific individuals who work in support of drug trafficking. This was done a few days later with the sanctions against Petro.

Pinzon was correct in that the situations in Colombia and Venezuela are extremely different and cannot be addressed with the same approach.

Venezuela has been a Bolivarian stronghold for decades, first under Chávez and then under Maduro. U.S. authorities contend that Venezuela has taken on a larger role in regional drug trafficking and has strengthened its ties with Iran, developments that have contributing to instability in the region. Under Maduro, Hezbollah's presence has proliferated in the country, becoming the main launching pad for drug trafficking to the United States.

Colombia, for its part, has always been a staunch ally of Washington, both in the fight against drug trafficking and against terrorism. The Colombian armed forces are trained by the United States and have been working together since the war against the Medellín and Cali cartels in the 1990s.

In 2022, Gustavo Petro was elected president, but despite his efforts, he was unable to separate the country's institutions from Washington. It's no coincidence that during the recent attempted attack by far-left protesters on the US Embassy in Bogotá, Petro had no choice but to deploy riot police to repel the attack, drawing criticism from his own supporters.

Critics argue that Petro’s government could face increasing internal challenges, and sanctions will certainly help. As for Maduro, however, some debate whether increased U.S. engagement may be required in the future, assuming Trump doesn't change his mind at the last minute.

Rising Tensions in the Region

The United States has deployed a massive military force of approximately 10,000 U.S. soldiers, most of them at bases in Puerto Rico, but also a contingent of Marines on amphibious assault ships, as well as F-35 fighters, MQ-9 Reaper drones, eight warships, and a submarine.

US navy ships and aircrafts have been sighted just a few hundreds of miles off the coast of Venezuela, while the US has been conducting raids against more narco-speed boats leaving the coasts of Colombia and Venezuela.

Moreover, the US Navy announced the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford, America’s largest warship, had arrived in the US Southern Command area of operations after US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered the Ford to head to the Caribbean from Europe in late October.

On the other side, this past week, Venezuela has announced a large-scale mobilisation of troops, weapons, and equipment in response to what it calls a growing U.S. military presence in the Caribbean Sea. Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez said land, air, naval, and reserve forces will conduct exercises through Wednesday, describing the operation as a response to what he termed the “imperialist threat” posed by the United States. The maneuvers will also include participation from the Bolivarian militia, a civilian reserve force aligned with the Maduro regime.

Whether all this mobilisation by the US serves merely to pressure the leader to resign peacefully or is instead instrumental in a regime change operation is another matter.

A full-scale U.S. invasion akin to the 1989 operation in Panama is highly improbable given Venezuela’s circumstances. The country’s vast size and complex geography, characterised by mountainous regions and dense jungle, provide ideal conditions for prolonged guerrilla warfare. Moreover, Venezuela’s armed forces are significantly more organised and capable than Panama’s were at the time. In addition, the Trump administration has shown little inclination to initiate new military conflicts.

A more plausible scenario for U.S. involvement might involve indirect support for a domestic uprising against the current regime, potentially through covert operations led by the Central Intelligence Agency, which may or may not already be active within Venezuelan territory.

November 7, 2025 — No Comments

The Diplomatic Overreach of Donald Trump

By Anurag Mishra and Pedro Mendes - US desk

Non-interventionism is generally regarded and commonly understood as a foreign policy of political or military non-involvement in the foreign relations or internal affairs of other countries. The United Nations makes the observance of the principle incumbent upon member states by including it in the UN Charter under Article 2.4. Nevertheless, in Morgenthaun's imagination, bigger states arm-twisting or even dominating the external and internal affairs of smaller states is rather unexceptional. The Banana Republic phenomenon may have become an old cliché, yet it remains a metaphorical reality in the present day. In contrast to small, powerless states being dictated by superpowers, there are also instances of more robust and formidable countries having to navigate a more powerful and demanding ally. This diplomatic overreach differs from direct threats or confrontations with adversaries; instead, it involves unsolicited initiatives that may carry consequences.

The rise of Donald Trump to the presidency and the range of diplomatic strategies he employed present a notable example of diplomatic overreach, or, if we may say so, interventionism by other means. Whether this on-camera diplomacy by Donald Trump is a calculated maneuver or simply part of his unconventional approach remains to be studied.

Cases in Point

Alluding to Arthur Schlesinger Jr. and his work, albeit through a different lens than wartime scenarios vis-à-vis the current context, it is possible to parallel a conceptual imperial presidency that leads to diplomatic overreach. We can observe similarities in the growing presidential primacy in foreign policy, concurrently with the use of unilateral tools, such as cutting foreign aid, exiting international organisations, issuing tariffs, and a considerable number of executive orders.

Under the constant framing of a looming threat, be it economic, migrant related, whether foreign or domestic, this narrative paves the way for this unilateral strategy. Bolstered by the placement of loyalists in institutions, such as the Foreign Service, this executive unilateralism fuels diplomatic overreach such as signaling Canada to become a US state. This example erodes the trust between allies, heightening tariff tensions between the two and giving the impression to other countries that the US may view friendly states as subordinate, reducing its credibility as a partner that respects sovereignty, and further raising security concerns and public perception issues.

This diplomatic overreach can again be exemplified in Trump’s call for the release of Bolsonaro. Trump’s public support for Bolsonaro’s release could influence Brazil’s international alignments, including its engagement with BRICS. This raises questions about respect for national sovereignty and undermines the US position when it later invokes non-interference or the rule of law.

Again, the call to the President of Israel to pardon Netanyahu can be viewed as a challenge to Israel’s judicial independence and sovereignty, weakening the alliance between the two. It can strengthen domestic opposition by showing Netanyahu as reliant on foreign assistance. Even if the narrative of “saving Israel” serves Netanyahu and the US geopolitical interests in the short term, it highlights Trump’s diplomatic overreach.

Picture: President Donald J. Trump and Vice President Mike Pence participate in an expanded bilateral meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Monday, Jan. 27, 2020, in the Oval Office of the White House. (Official White House Photo by D. Myles Cullen)

Interventionism V. Diplomacy

In international relations, interventionism refers to the intentional involvement of one state in the internal or external affairs of another, whether through military invasion, economic coercion, or political manipulation, to promote security, values, or influence. Powerful states often use interventionist strategies to secure zones of influence and proactively shape global outcomes. The creation of buffer states, client states, and banana republics exemplifies how interventionism operates beyond overt military force. A buffer state serves as a geopolitical buffer between rival powers; a client state functions under the economic or military dominance of a patron; and the term “banana republic” describes countries whose economic and political systems are subordinated to foreign strategic or business interests, often accompanied by interventionism.

By contrast, diplomacy ostensibly uses negotiation, persuasion, and representation rather than coercion. However, diplomacy itself harbors a covert element, namely, intelligence gathering, back-channel negotiations, and subtle influence campaigns, which buttress the art of statecraft.

In recent years, Trump’s foreign policy has illustrated how interventionism and diplomacy merge on the spectrum of influence, giving birth to a lesser-seen phenomenon of “Overt Diplomacy” or “Interference, not Intervention”. Interestingly, the countries on the receiving end of Trump’s interference aren’t meek bananas or clients, but powerful countries and formidable allies.

President Trump’s attempts in Brazil, where he publicly defended former President Jair Bolsonaro, threatened 50 % tariffs on Brazilian goods if legal proceedings continued, and in Israel, where he intervened in the legal process of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by publicly calling for his corruption trial to be canceled or pardoned, and reversing sanctions on Israeli settler groups, moves that have been interpreted by some observers undermining judicial independence, put across a rarely seen act of public and overt diplomacy. The reason the American president has chosen to conduct his business in public view is that this unique brand of diplomacy appears to serve both domestic and international political purposes. Such public interventions allow him to project strength, command global attention, and consolidate internal support, even when legal or normative costs mount.

*Picture: (Washington, DC - EUA 19/03/2019) Presidente da República Jair Bolsonaro responde perguntas da imprensa durante o encontro. Foto: Isac Nóbrega/PR*

Conclusion

The Trumpian model of “Overt Diplomacy” evidenced interesting aspects, merging both appeal and coercion. Usually shielded from public displays, these attempts at interference reverse that trend and have both domestic and foreign consequences, conveying the image of assertive leadership. Aimed not at rivals, but at traditional allies, it walks a fine line, risking old alliances while balancing them with short-term political gains. However, the consequences of this trade-off remain uncertain.

July 8, 2024 — No Comments

Cold Horizons: The Arctic’s Strategic Role Then and Now

by Isolde Sylvia Hatgis-Kessell - Arctic Desk

The Arctic region played a crucial role in the strategic competition between the United States and the Soviet Union throughout the Cold War, with its unique geographical and environmental conditions shaping both military and scientific efforts. This article explores the Soviet Union's Arctic strategy, focusing on its dual purposes of showcasing military might and technological superiority; subsequently, it explores the significant changes in the region since the Cold War, namely climate change and increased Chinese involvement, and anticipates how these factors will influence Moscow’s current ambitions in the Arctic.

Overview of the Role of the Soviet Arctic Strategy

During the Cold War, the Arctic acted as another arena for strategic competition between the United States and Russia, the importance of which was underscored by the unprecedented close proximity between the adversarial states. For the Soviet Union, the Arctic was a critical region as it possessed the “longest Arctic circumpolar coastline” and the largest population of Arctic inhabitants from one state. Moreover, Russia under both the Tsarist and Soviet systems, had a longer history of involvement in the region.

The Russian Arctic served two key purposes for the Soviet Union throughout the Cold War; firstly, it was home to a significant portion of their advanced military equipment including the nuclear Northern Fleet. Secondly, the High North gave the Soviets a stage to exhibit their technological advancements and military might, a key competition during the Cold War.

However, the Arctic region remained underexplored and underutilised across various sectors due to harsh weather conditions; thus, the utility of the High North was closely tied to the advancement of technology which enabled effective exploration and greater understanding of the area.

A vital component of the Soviet’s Arctic strategy was the use of the region as a theatre to demonstrate scientific and military strength, directly playing into Cold War dynamics. A key example can be seen in the development and testing of the Tsar Bomb, commissioned by Nikita Gorbaschev in a bid to demonstrate Soviet strength. The thermonuclear bomb remains the most powerful nuclear weapon ever detonated; the test took place on the island of Novaya Zemlya inside the Soviet’s Arctic Territory. The Arctic arena became a frequent stage for projects that strengthened the Soviet’s Mutually Assured Destruction strategic doctrine.

Scientific superiority underpinned by military objectives, an important characteristic of the Cold War, extended to the Arctic as well. The Soviets developed the Severny Polyus drifting research station in the Arctic; while the projects themselves were aimed at scientific goals, the information that they collected was used to help inform the military action and procurement.

Ultimately, the Arctic provided the perfect theatre for the Soviets to prove their strength in both science and force and therefore cement their position on the international stage and against the United States.

Key Changes Since the Cold War

The Soviet’s strategy in the Arctic during the Cold War can serve as a good starting point to understand how Putin and the Russian Federation might use the region now, particularly as relations continue to deteriorate with the West. Nonetheless, three key changes must be considered in any analysis of the region.

First and foremost are the effects of climate change which has increased sea levels, changed patterns of wildlife, and importantly melted a significant amount of the region's ice. Paradoxically, these devastating environmental consequences open up a breadth of new economic opportunities. As a result, interest in the region from the rest of the littoral Arctic states and beyond has increased drastically; this leads directly to the second defining shift, increased Chinese involvement.

As the ice continues to melt, opening new possibilities for oil and gas exploration and increasing the feasibility of the Northern Sea Route, China’s interest in the Arctic has developed as well. Generally, Beijing has looked to Moscow for partnerships in the region which has alienated many of the other Arctic states.

Lastly, all the Arctic countries are now members of NATO except for Russia; as the war rages on in Ukraine and tensions with the West deepen, this reality threatens Arctic exceptionalism which thus far has been dictated by cooperation overriding competition.

*Source - Photo by Bo Eide on Flickr* - credits

Understanding Russia’s Current and Future Strategy in the Arctic

Most recently, the 2023 Russian Foreign Policy Concept gave the international community new insight into Russia’s ambitions in the Arctic. With regards to the High North, the document highlights the importance of possible economic development in the region for the greater Russian economy including oil and gas exploration and the development of the Northern Sea Route. A noticeable change from the 2016 concept was the decision not to address any existing multilateral format such as the Arctic Council, and instead emphasise that partnerships with other nations, most likely with the other Arctic states, would be on a bilateral basis.

Understanding Russia’s strategy in the high north through the prism of Soviet action in the Arctic indicates that Putin, with the help of the Chinese Communist Party, may use the Arctic as an arena to exert strength in the energy sector, shipping routes, and the military, possibly setting up a parallel system to Soviet times in which these aims become intrinsically linked.

As the war in Ukraine continues, in turn highlighting the weakness of the Russian military and leadership, the Arctic can again serve as an easy arena to demonstrate strength. Novaya Zemlya remains a key test base for nuclear weapons including the unconfirmed 9M730 Burevestnik, a nuclear cruise missile. The war in Ukraine has emphasised that much of Russia’s military equipment is old and reserves of modern weapons are ultimately too small. Consequently, Moscow may attempt to reaffirm their military prowess by developing weapons for a harsh environment that NATO Arctic states lack.

Another defining trait of the Ukraine war has been the West’s sanction regime and subsequent consequences for global energy markets. The decision not to purchase any oil from Russia has had serious, though not insurmountable, repercussions, particularly for European countries. As the potential for new energy resources opens up the Arctic, it is possible that Russia looks to establish a strong position in this development to maintain its foothold in international energy.

Conclusion

The Soviet’s Arctic strategy throughout the Cold War was a critical component of their broader geopolitical and military objectives; the High North provided a strategic platform for the Soviet Union to demonstrate both scientific advancements and military prowess. As Russia continues to build up its presence in the Arctic, parallels to Soviet-era strategies, especially in energy and military domains, are increasingly likely, underscoring the region's ongoing importance for the U.S. and the Nordic countries as well as global power dynamics

January 18, 2024 — No Comments

AI Regulatory Landscape in the US and the EU: Regulating the Unknown – AI, Cybersecurity, Space Group

Author: Oleg Abdurashitov and Caterina Panzetti - AI, Cyber Security & Space Team

Among other things 2023 was a year of AI regulation in the EU, US and well beyond. The fundamental challenge that policymakers face in the case of AI is that, in essence, they are often dealing with the unknowns resulting from the complexity of the technology itself and the break-neck speed of its development and adoption. Given the incessant debate on whether AI poses an existential risk to humanity that needs to be addressed at the earlier stages or if such existential risks are merely a smoke screen to the far more urgent and practical implications of widespread AI deployment on privacy, copyright, human rights, labor market, setting the regulatory priorities appears to be challenging. Analyzing what the regulators in the US and Europe chose to focus on and how they framed AI regulatory doctrine may help to better understand not just their priorities but the differences in respective institutional, political and economic environments and approaches to dealing with the emerging technologies.

United States

Despite the existential threat narrative peddled by the largest industry players, including at the Senate hearings, thePresidential Order Order on the Safe, Secure, and Trustworthy Development and Use of Artificial Intelligence seems to be more grounded in the current reality when assessing AI's potential risks. While the act attempts to address several critical security issues - from AI-enabled cyber operations to the threat of WMD (Weapon of Mass Destruction) development - it can nonetheless be viewed as an effort to prepare the American economy and society for the age of AI use across the numerous (if not all) sectors.

The Order’s approach is based on the unique strength of the US economy and governance model that heavily relies on the enormous capacity of the US tech sector, as well as on the diverse environment of the nation’s civil society, where educational institutions, think tanks, and the legal system all play a role in shaping and implementing regulations. Probably, the most critical aspect of the AI regulatory environment is that in the US the recent AI breakthroughs are funded by private capital as opposed to the state budgets like in China^[1] or, largely, the EU^[2]. This, on the one hand, allows the US to retain the competitive edge in the AI race, with the so-called MAGMA^[3] companies bearing a large share of the R&D costs in developing breakthrough commercial AI products. On the other, this puts the US government in a position where the sectoral regulation shall be balanced against the interests of the commercial players and enable, rather than control, the technology development and adoption.

The Order implicitly acknowledges this complex interplay between the commercial interests, the interests of the state, and American society’s demands. Section 2 (Policy and Principles) in particular broadly outlines the many aspects of AI development - from safety to impact on the workforce - that need to be balanced against each other. Again, given the enormity of such a task, the Order is short on specific details - and when such details are given they often leave the question of whether it will be able to address the long-term security implications of AI development open.

For instance, in Section 4 the Order puts the “dual-use foundation models” that may pose “a serious risk to security, national economic security, national public health or safety” under increased regulatory and technical scrutiny. The definition of such a model as the one containing “at least tens of billions of parameters” covers the leading large language models (LLMs) behind ChatGPT and Google Bard, with each having more than 100 billion parameters. The Order’s approach to regulating such powerful models relies largely on industry guidelines (such as the NIST AI Risk Management Framework^[4]) developed in collaboration with the private sector players themselves complemented by a series of government-funded testbeds for risk assessment.

It is important to note, that while the commonly agreed approach to AI model training can be described as “greater is better”, there is evidence that the output of models with a far smaller number of parameters (1.5B to 2.7B) can be somewhat comparable to that of larger models^[5]. Additionally, while larger models are generally controlled by specific entities, the open-source models (such as Meta’s Llama available in packages of 7B, 13B, and 70B parameters^[6]) may be used by a far wider number of actors developing their own powerful models, potentially falling outside the regulatory scrutiny and export control measures.

More so, the Order explicitly focuses on very large models as subject to regulatory restrictions, like “[a] model that was trained using a quantity of computing power greater than 10²⁶ integer or floating-point operations”. That number, for instance, is significantly higher than the rumoured estimates for the most advanced model in the market today - OpenAI’s GPT-4 - which currently stands around 2.15 x 10²⁵ FLOPs (floating point operations)^[7]. If the field will sustain the current pace of innovation, this threshold may well be crossed shortly. However, there is so far little evidence that such models would indeed represent “potential capabilities that could be used in malicious cyber-enabled activity” since malicious cyber operations of today require far less computing power and the “cyber-enabled” definition may simply be too broad to have meaning in regulatory context.

Of course, the proposed control regime for the large ‘dual-use models’ need not necessarily fully address the issue of AI-powered malicious activity as of today. Instead, the Order directs federal agencies to study the best practices and guidelines of the critical infrastructure sectors to manage “AI-specific cybersecurity risks” and “develop tools to evaluate AI capabilities to generate outputs that may represent nuclear, nonproliferation, biological, chemical, critical infrastructure, and energy-security threats or hazards” as well as assess the risks of AI usage in the critical infrastructure and government systems. From this point of view, the Order implicitly acknowledges the fact that AI models are already largely deployed both in the private and public sectors and calls for measures to discover and reduce the risks of such use.

Notably, the US DoD’s Data, Analytics, and Artificial Intelligence Adoption Strategy^[8], released months earlier in June 2023 prioritizes speed of deployment over careful risk assessment that the Presidential Order entails. To the military, the “[AI deployment] risks will be managed not by flawless forecasting, but by continuous deployment powered by campaigns of learning”. More so, the DoD calls for mitigation of policy barriers through consensus building and closer relations with vendors, as well as the AI community at large. Despite the risks of AI deployment being no less profound in the military sector than in civilian affairs, the US Government as a customer may well choose the speed of decision-making - and many other benefits that AI can potentially bring to warfighting - to a more careful and balanced approach.

*Source: https://www.pexels.com/photo/blue-bright-lights-373543/*

EU AI Act

2021 has been marked by a race towards gaining normative authority in the field of Artificial Intelligence-enabled services. The European Union has been leading this chase by engaging in an omni comprehensive risk-oriented approach to AI regulation, providing for a broad regulatory framework to ensure securitization and protection of fundamental rights.

The Commission has indeed proposed a model founded on a decreasing scale of risk-based obligations to which providers will have to adhere to be able to continue conducting their business in the European Union, irrespective of their place of establishment[1]. Regarding the service providers which surpass the threshold of what the legislator has referred to as “high risk”, the AI Act imposes a ban upon them, and thus will not be allowed to distribute their services in the Union, as they are deemed to pose an unacceptable risk to the livelihood and safety of the users of such service. Just a tire under the said forbidden services, the providers which have been labelled as “high risk” will have to comply with the most burdensome obligations. Notably, the proposed regulation will not have any impact on AI systems implemented for military purposes.

The high-risk providers are identified with critical infrastructures which deeply affect the users’ daily lives, and which could potentially implement discriminatory or harmful practices. The non-exhaustive list comprises providers that supply technologies applied for transportation or employment purposes, migration management, administration of justice and law enforcement processes[2]. Providers of such services will be asked to supply, among other requirements, adequate risk assessments, and a high level of robustness and security to make sure that “AI systems are resilient against attempts to alter their use, behaviour, performance or compromise their security properties by malicious third parties exploiting the system’s vulnerabilities”[3], and detailed documentation providing all information necessary on the system and its purpose for authorities to assess its compliance[4]. Although the Parliament has included all biometric identification systems as high risk, Italy, Hungary and France have been pushing to implement a more lenient regime for the employment of biometric identification instruments for surveillance purposes. The result of this debate is to be seen at the moment of ratification of the Act.

Despite the praiseworthy effort of the European legislator in setting up standards which prioritize fundamental rights and security for its citizens, endorsed also by the setup of clear enforcement measures and fines directed to the misbehaving providers; it is pivotal to highlight some challenges that regulating AI will pose on future legislative attempts.

Firstly, the main area of concern regards the tug of war between maintaining a firm hold over high-risk service providers and, on the other hand, ensuring the smooth progress of AI innovation in the EU. We will likely be witnessing a certain degree of lobbying practices from what arguably represent the top-tier AI companies based in the US (mainly, META, OpenAI, Google, Deepmind etc.); hence watering down the original scope of the Act. This concern rapidly escalated to a concrete debate over the regulation of foundation models. “The foundation models, such as GPT-3.5 - the large language model that powers OpenAI’s ChatGPT-, are trained on vast amounts of data and are able to carry out a wide range of tasks in a number of use cases. They are some of the most powerful, valuable and potentially risky AI systems in existence”[5]. While the proposed Act was keen on firmly regulating foundation models, a trialogue was initiated between the German, Italian and French governments to loosen the grip over these providers by proposing a self-regulation system, and strongly criticising Brussels for over-regulating service providers’ conduct and hindering innovation in the Union[6]. The leaders of said countries also expressed deep concern about the possibility that smaller European-based companies will not be able to keep up with the obligations raised by the Act[7]. While the Parliament maintains a firm formal position over the impossibility of excluding the foundation models, it is apparent that this opposition could furthermore potentially trigger the stalemate of the legislative iter.

A second criticality was identified by the exclusion from the scope of the Act of AI instruments applied for military, national security and national defence purposes. Civil society organizations have indeed expressed major concern towards the possibility that technologies which would be theoretically labelled as posing an unacceptable risk could be implemented if they fall under the umbrella of the scope of defending national security, but, additionally, that dual-use technology could be employed without any regulatory restriction[8].

Finally, the Act faces issues regarding its coordination with the US Order. Albeit both legislative instruments are based on a risk-based approach, the Senate has been more hesitant to espouse the European hard line. As Alex Engler - associate in governance studies at The Brookings Institution- wrote for Stanford University: “There’s a growing disparity between the U.S. and the EU approach in regulating AI. The EU has moved forward on laws around data privacy, online platforms, and online e-commerce regulation, and more, while similar legislation is absent in the U.S”[9]. Furthermore, the US Order struggles to draw clear-cut enforcement measures against companies which happen to be in breach of their obligations, therefore it is clear that the priority of the American legislator lies mostly in maintaining international competitiveness[10]. Needless to say, the lack of homogeneous standards hinders physical and legal persons, the latter being obliged to change their operativity depending on the country of distribution of services.

Despite the said shortcomings, the Act will hopefully be the Kickstarter of a broader strategy able to compensate for the strict approach adopted in the regulation, thus attracting investments and levelling the competition with the US.

[1] https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/a-comparative-perspective-on-ai-regulation

[2] https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/regulatory-framework-ai

[3] https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:52021PC0206

[4] Ibid.

[5] https://time.com/6338602/eu-ai-regulation-foundation-models/

[6] Ibid.

[7] Ibid.

[8] https://www.stopkillerrobots.org/news/what-are-the-ai-act-and-the-council-of-europe-convention/

[9] https://hai.stanford.edu/news/analyzing-european-union-ai-act-what-works-what-needs-improvement

[10] https://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/news-events/the-eu-and-the-us-two-different-approaches-to-ai-governance/

^[1] https://cset.georgetown.edu/article/in-out-of-china-financial-support-for-ai-development/

^[2] https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/european-approach-artificial-intelligence

^[3] https://twitter.com/ylecun/status/1662375684612685825?lang=en

^[4] https://www.nist.gov/itl/ai-risk-management-framework

^[5] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/when-it-comes-to-ai-models-bigger-isnt-always-better/

^[6] https://ai.meta.com/llama/

^[7] https://hackernoon.com/the-next-era-of-ai-inside-the-breakthrough-gpt-4-model

^[8] https://media.defense.gov/2023/Nov/02/2003333300/-1/-1/1/DOD_DATA_ANALYTICS_AI_ADOPTION_STRATEGY.PDF

November 6, 2023 — No Comments

Israel’s Possible War Scenarios: From a Temporarily Restrained Conflict to a Prolonged All-out War

Author: Omri Brinner - Middle East Team

With the beginning of its ground invasion into the Gaza Strip, Israel is at a crossroads it hoped it wouldn’t be in. It can be argued that any route Israel would take in this historic intersection would lead to regional escalation, even if only in the long-run. It is safe to assume, then, that even if there is no immediate backlash to the Israeli ground invasion, another front, sooner or later, will follow.

The most popular Israeli approach in responding to the October 7 Hamas attack is that the IDF’s infantry and armored brigades would invade the Gaza Strip, backed by heavy artillery, actionable intelligence, and preceded by intense aerial bombardment (as is happening). Israel, it has been argued, must respond forcefully, or else it would project to its enemies that it would refrain from war at all costs.

The ground invasion itself is meant to root out Hamas from the Gaza Strip and to disable its military capabilities. The other objective is the release of the 239 Israeli and foreign hostages, most of whom are civilians. Ideally – from Israel's point of view – the IDF would achieve its goals in the Gaza Strip without having to fight on another front simultaneously, as its capabilities in fighting multiple fronts at the same time are limited, and such a scenario will necessitate Israel to change its objectives. However, this is the least likely scenario. Total victory against Hamas is not guaranteed – and even unlikely within the limits of military power – and the ground operation can last for months. What is more likely is that Israel would embark on a limited ground incursion (due to American pressure and the possibility of another front elsewhere), achieve some tactical victories against Hamas, and will force a ceasefire on better conditions – which would lead to the release of some hostages (most likely women, children, and the elderly). However, the restrained war efforts in Gaza will surely be followed by war and terror on other fronts, and possibly simultaneously.

One ongoing front is in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, where Hamas, armed militias, and lone-wolf terrorists take arms against Israeli civilians and security personnel. At the time of the Hamas attack on October 7, most of the IDF was stationed in the West Bank, demonstrating its symbolic and strategic importance to Israel. The latter would have to react forcefully to any significant development there. It is in Hamas’ interest to start a new intifada in the West Bank, and possibly in Israeli cities, in order to destabilize and weaken Israel.

The other ongoing front, where Israel might face a full-scale war, is from the north. Hezbollah, with its arsenal of 150,000 projectiles (of close, medium, and long range) and army of approximately 100,000 soldiers, most of whom are well-trained and with some battle experience, pose a strategic threat – even bigger than the one Hamas poses.

Thus far, Hezbollah – which is backed by Iran and serves as its most strategic proxy in the region – has been reacting to Israel’s limited ground invasion, albeit with restraint. While Hezbollah needs to show it is committed to the Palestinian cause, it aims to avoid an all-out war with Israel.

*Source: https://twitter.com/IDFSpokesperson/status/1721014635623522767/photo/4*

According to Israeli calculation, an all-out war is not fully in Hezbollah’s interests, nor is it in Iran’s. According to this theory, both Iran and Hezbollah would rather open an all-out war with Israel only once Iran guarantees applicable nuclear military capabilities, which, in the long run, seems inevitable. This means that from Israel’s point of view – and contrary to the best-case scenario described above – it would be better for Israel to engage with Hezbollah and Iran before the latter becomes a nuclear power.

Israel, then, might choose to attack Hezbollah and either drag it into the war – and by so eliminating the surprise element of Hezbollah’s reaction – or, if Hezbollah chooses not to retaliate, to reestablish its deterrence up north. While it may seem like an act of self harm, the Israeli public would view a Hezbollah surprise attack as another failure of the government, IDF, Shin Bet and Mossad. In a way, then, these institutions hope to project to the public that Israel is on the front foot, and that if a war with Hezbollah and Iran is inevitable in the long run, then better now than later. It is important to note that while Israel calculates that the two Shia powers would rather avoid an all-out war prior to Iran’s nuclearization, Israel’s working assumption that Hamas was deterred and would have opted to avoid an armed conflict fell apart with the October 7 attack. Therefore, there are no guarantees that any theory that existed before the attack is still relevant.

Would Iran and Hezbollah wait peacefully for an Israeli strike, or for it to finish its fighting in Gaza? Unlikely. From their point of view, Iran and Hezbollah are happy to let Israel keep guessing whether they would join the war or not. From Israel’s standpoint, it cannot afford to be surprised again. While it is less likely that there would be a ground invasion from the north following the one from the Gaza Strip on October 7, an extensive missile attack on central Israel would be just as bad.

But initiating war with Hezbollah – and Iran – would force the US into the conflict, as it would be extremely challenging – on the verge of impossible – for Israel to conduct an all-out war with Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran simultaneously. At the same time, if US forces end up fighting alongside Israel, then it is likely that other Iranian allies would occupy the US forces elsewhere in the region (such as in Yemen, Iraq, and Syria). While a recent poll shows that the vast majority of Americans are against US military involvement in the Middle East, the US would feel it has to protect its allies and interests in the region.

It seems, then, that the region is ahead of a long period – whether months or years – of an armed conflict.

February 2, 2022 — No Comments

The Ukrainian Crisis which Washington wants Resolved Quickly

By: Francesco Cirillo

*Image Source*: https://pixabay.com/photos/moscow-spasskaya-tower-3895333/

With the letter delivered to Moscow the dialogue on the guarantees linked to security put forward by the Russian Federation, we enter the difficult task of keeping open a channel that should aim at a decrease in tensions on the Russian-Ukrainian border.

For Moscow now it is necessary time for Russian President Vladimir Putin to carefully analyze all the documents received from both the United States and NATO; but Russian foreign minister Lavrov himself said that both Washington and the Atlantic Alliance rejected Russia’s request to suspend NATO’s eastward expansion.

While both NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg and US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken have stated that they are ready for dialogue with the Kremlin, which at the moment has given no signs of reducing troops (according to some networks, almost 100,000 men and armored vehicles) near the border with Ukraine. To increase the pressure on the Russian leadership and Putin, Blinken himself stated that in the event of a Russian invasion, Washington would implement a strategy, with Berlin, to block the completion of the North Stream 2 gas pipeline. Europe. The Chinese Foreign Ministry has asked the United States to take Russian concerns seriously.

The US dilemma on the Ukrainian crisis concerns the desire to resolve it quickly to avoid bogging down the other dossiers that the Biden administration considers vital, first and foremost the internal economic situation and the internal pandemic. Other concerns the issues concerning the Indo-Pacific and that concerning the confrontation with China. It is vital for Washington to resolve the issue in Europe that it avoids engaging directly and leaving the field to the European allies of the EU and NATO. In recent days, Jens Stoltenberg declared that NATO will not send Pact troops to Kiev, a statement also accompanied by the US, a statement coming from the White House spokesman, in which it was explicitly stated that the United States does not intend to send troops in Ukraine.

In this Kiev finds itself closed by the desire to prepare for a possible Russian invasion and with only informal and diplomatic support, with economic and military aid that comes from the Baltic countries, Poland and the UK. Meanwhile, Moscow decides to keep the units near the Ukrainian border and the US has put 8,500 people on alert ready to be deployed in NATO allied countries. Another burden will concern the possible negotiations between Washington and Moscow on the "security guarantees" that the latter expects to deal with. The Kremlin aims to gain recognition of its spheres of influence from neighboring countries and opposition to the entry of Moldova, Georgia and Ukraine into the Atlantic Alliance. On the opposite front, both Washington and NATO, in the documents delivered to Moscow, ask the Russians to start a diplomatic path that leads to discussing Russian requests and a possible de-escalation but rejecting the request to suspend expansion towards Eastern Europe.

The dialogue between Moscow and Washington / NATO / EU continues, but with 100,000 troops from the Russian Federation close to the Ukrainian borders.

October 8, 2021 — No Comments

South Africa strategies in the international arena: is it an “atypical” African country?

The “International system & World order - Africa” interviews Riaan Eksteen from the University of Johannesburg. Mr Eksteen has been a member of the South African Foreign Service for 27 years and he served at the South African embassy in Washington, D.C. He was also Ambassador and Head of Mission at the UN New York, Namibia, Geneva, and Turkey. Riaan Eksteen talks about the international role of South Africa in the BRICS, with the new US administration, and the African Union.

Interviewers: Michele Tallarini and Rebecca Pedemonte

April 4, 2021 — No Comments

US-China Geopolitical Competition In Indo-Pacific and Asia-Pacific

Dr Zeno Leoni, ITSS-Verona Executive Director, discusses on the dynamics and implications of US-China geopolitical tensions in Asia.