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Starting with a discussion of the contradictory trends shaping the global economy in the 2020s, this essay focuses on three technology-intensive sectors: defense, pharmaceuticals, and energy. In the defense sector, the Russian-Ukraine war and the tensions in East Asia ended a long period of slow growth with a 'call to arms' and rearmament across OECD. The challenge of the Western industries now is to accelerate output and capacity in a broad range of subsectors and support the safe supply of weapons and spare parts to the Ukrainian army. Thus, RUW is also a battle between different skills in management, logistics, leadership, and training systems, which offers a rich arena for future research in these fields. In the pharmaceutical sector, the Covid-19 outbreak initiated another call to arms, and the industry was quick to respond by rapidly delivering new, effective vaccines. This coincided with a breakthrough for new approaches to cancer treatment, with a potential for major public health benefits, if the industry can handle the side effects and policymakers design cost-effective delivery systems with wide coverage. Again, this calls for focused research in the fields of management, innovation studies, and economics. The third sector discussed in this essay, electricity production, was caught in a perfect storm by the outbreak of the new war. However, the net effect seems to be a major increase in investments in renewables. This creates new challenges regarding, for example, system stability, combinations of flexible and nuclear-based power sources, and the cost-effective diffusion of renewables to emerging economies, thus another arena for important future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The armed forces of a country face numerous challenges in their professional lives which affect both their physical and mental health. Literature provides evidence that exposure to war like situations and conflicts exert stress amongst the military personnel. Despite such high intensity conflict situations cases of impaired mental health are low among the armed forces personnel which can be explained as resilient behaviour. Therefore the objective of the present study was to study the effect of time of exposure to prolonged war on the resilience levels of military personnel, specifically the Indian army personnel. The sample of the study included N=106 Indian army personnel serving in the high intensity conflict regions of Jammu and Kashmir, India. The sample was assessed quantitatively using the resilience questionnaire by Lakshmi and Narain and results were calculated. The results were quantitatively analysed using one-way ANOVA statistical method and it was found that soldiers with 3 to 10 months of exposure to high intensity conflict region had low to average levels of resilience whereas soldiers with 10 to 24months of exposure had resilience levels ranging from average to high. Hence it was revealed that resilience of soldiers with more exposure to prolonged war was higher than those who had less duration of prolonged war. Furthermore, the need for more research in importance of resilience building as part of combat training is discussed in the research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In response to the needs of military families confronting the challenges of prolonged war, we developed Families OverComing Under Stress (FOCUS), a multi-session intervention for families facing multiple deployments and combat stress injuries adapted from existing evidence-based family prevention interventions (Lester et al. in Mil Med 176(1): 19–25, 2011 ). In an implementation of this intervention contracted by the US Navy Bureau of Medicine and Surgery (BUMED), FOCUS teams were deployed to military bases in the United States and the Pacific Rim to deliver a suite of family-centered preventive services based on the FOCUS model (Beardslee et al. in Prev Sci 12(4): 339–348, 2011 ). Given the number of families affected by wartime service and the changing circumstances they faced in active duty and veteran settings, it rapidly became evident that adaptations of this approach for families in other contexts were needed. We identified the core elements of FOCUS that are essential across all adaptations: (1) Family Psychological Health Check-in; (2) family-specific psychoeducation; (3) family narrative timeline; and (4) family-level resilience skills (e.g., problem solving). In this report, we describe the iterative process of adapting the intervention for different groups of families: wounded, ill, and injured warriors, families with young children, couples, and parents. We also describe the process of adopting this intervention for use in different ecological contexts to serve National Guard, Reserve and veterans, and utilization of technology-enhanced platforms to reach geographically dispersed families. We highlight the lessons learned when faced with the need to rapidly deploy interventions, adapt them to the changing, growing needs of families under real-world circumstances, and conduct rigorous evaluation procedures when long-term, randomized trial designs are not feasible to meet an emergent public health need. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors analyze a bargaining model of war that incorporates both commitment problems due to shifting power and asymmetric information. Four results emerge when both bargaining problems are present. First, in contrast to asymmetric information models, the resolution of uncertainty through fighting can lead to the continuation of war rather than its termination. Second, wars can be less—not more—likely to end in settlement the longer they last. Third, war aims increase over time as a belligerent becomes more confident that its opponent will grow unacceptably strong in the future. Finally, the dynamics that characterize wars in purely asymmetric information or commitment models should exist only when the other factor is absent. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Why is armed civil conflict more common in resource-dependent countries than in others? Several studies have attempted to unravel mechanisms on why natural resources are linked to armed conflict, but no coherent picture has yet emerged. This article seeks to address this puzzle by concentrating on the issue of how rebel access to natural resources affects conflict. It uses data on gemstone and hydrocarbon localities throughout the world and controls for the spatial and temporal overlap of resources and conflict. The results show that the location of resources is crucial to their impact on conflict duration. If resources are located inside the actual conflict zone, the duration of conflict is doubled. Interestingly, oil and gas reserves have this effect on duration regardless of whether there has been production or not. In addition, a country-level analysis suggests that oil production increases the risk of conflict onset when located onshore; offshore production has no effect on onset. These results support the assertion that natural resources play a central role in armed civil conflicts because of the incentives and opportunities they present for rebel groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although prolonged occupation of a nation is no longer a common phenomenon, where it does exist, it bears harsh implications for all parties involved. This article examines the socio-psychological implications of occupation on the occupying society, using the case of the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip since 1967 as an example. The article first delineates the concept of occupation from a socio-psychological perspective, which supplements the legal-formal aspect. The authors then propose a conceptual framework that analyzes the psychology of the occupying society. Within this framework, they describe the psychological challenges that the occupation may pose to the members of the occupying society. Next, they introduce psychological mechanisms that members of an occupying society may use in order to avoid facing these challenges. Finally, they offer a number of ideas regarding the relationship between these mechanisms and the process of ending the occupation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I extend the implications of a rationalist model of war initiation to explore the effects of uncertainty about the cost of prosecuting a war to victory on the duration and outcome of military operations. When the attributes of a potential armed conflict create uncertainty about the human and material costs of attaining a state's war aims, states are at risk of selecting themselves into long, costly, and ultimately unsuccessful military engagements. The more the actual costs of fighting exceed a state's prewar expectations, the greater the likelihood that it will eventually be pushed beyond its cost-tolerance threshold and forced to unilaterally withdraw from the conflict before it attains its war aims. At the same time, states must fight longer before they arrive at accurate estimates of what it will cost to attain their objectives when the attributes of a conflict contribute to high levels of uncertainty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The wars in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have seen the recruitment of flip-flop clad rebels and instability arising because soldiers have not received their salary of a few dollars. Conversely, demobilisation programmes, which bring promises of reintegration grants, have not attracted people to disarm. This paper examines this conundrum alongside three features of the situation in Congo: the informalisation of politics and the economy, the exercise of power through violence, and the multiple crises in which people are living. Drawing on reports on demobilisation and interviews conducted in Congo, the paper investigates what implications these three aspects have for demobilisation, and what is achieved by the programmes as they stand. It argues that demobilisation programmes do not address fighters' motivations, and outcomes are largely immaterial. Instead there is a political pillage - akin to the pillages that took place across Congo in the early 1990s - by which some parties make immediate gains, whilst shaping the conditions for longer term losses and destructive systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the tactics that enemies of the U.S. Armed Forces employed to learn and adapt to pressures of a long war. According to the author, the country needs to develop a counterterrorism strategy that is based on understanding, targeting, eliminating these transnational support networks in order to defeat that tentacles of global jihad.

Analyzes why both the U.S. bombing of Afghanistan and Israel's massacre of the Palestinians violate international law. Factors that contribute to the conditions that create hatred within the Arab world directed at the U.S.; Reasons behind the United States dependency on foreign oil; Reason the bombing of Afghanistan is not an authorized self-defense.

Contradicts the prevalent view that the Palestinians, rather than Israel, bear the greater share of the responsibility for the breakdown of the peace process and the entire course of the Israel-Palestinian conflict since 1948. Effect of United States economic and military assistance to Israel; Distortions in the historical narrative from the Israeli perspective; Wasted leverage of the American government.

Discusses the causes the prolongation of wars, in relation to why the war in Liberia continued and the war in Sierra Leone continued. Factors which contributed to the prolongation of the wars in Liberia and Sierra Leone; Discussion on the ineffectiveness of the International community; Examination of the military stalemate in both countries.

The article reports on various wars involving the Turks in Asia Minor. These reveals that the Turks had a sanguinary battle with the French troops, with 1,200 dead left on the battlefield. A threatened attack was also determined between the forces of the Azerbaidjan and the Mustapha Kermal's Turkish Nationalists, which was aided by Armenia. Furthermore, the author mentions that the Kurds threatened the Turks in the South.