Pakistan on the Precipice

Return to the Abyss

Back to the Brink in Ukraine

Northeast Asia on the Brink

Russia is moving toward precipice.

GENEVA The trouble with brinkmanship of the type now being played out over Iran s nuclear program is that it is so easy to fall over the cliff.

To the Brink and Back with Iran

Pessimists and skeptics have plenty to point to in Iran s long record of obstruction and brinkmanship in addressing legitimate international concerns about its nuclear programs.

That is the precipice on which Greece stands today.

BERKELEY Europe is again on the precipice.

MADRID Once again, Europe has peered into the abyss.

We urge the Assembly to step back from the brink.

Nor is sympathy at work China does not buy Treasuries because it wants to temper the pain of America s fiscal brinkmanship.

The problem with brinkmanship is that, sometimes, one does go over the brink.

The diplomacy of sanctions, ostracism, and brinkmanship has failed resoundingly.

It is held culpable for the near financial meltdown.

Only after its security is assured will China free itself from complicity in North Korean brinkmanship and be better able to control the North s behavior.

The financial sector and its free market ideology had brought the world to the brink of ruin.

For countries on the brink, a merciless logic follows.

LONDON Syria is a living nightmare. Egypt hovers on the brink.

There were many occasions when South Africa s fate appeared touch and go.

Similarly, rather than demand that North Korea stop its brinkmanship, China s leaders have called for emergency consultations involving the United States, Japan, Russia, China, the United Nations, and South Korea.

Some of the Middle East s most important players are increasing the risks of confrontation because they have either lost a proper feeling for their regional and international environment, or seek to increase their own political power through provocation and brinkmanship.

So, while others have to step forward to do their part, it is best if Greece steps back from the brink.

Then, once the European project is halfway over the cliff, the federalist moment might arrive.

It is one thing to guide people up a mountain it is another to lead them to the edge of a cliff.

We're sitting on the edge of a precipice, and we have the tools and the technology at our hands to communicate what needs to be done to hold it together today.

Russia will start to feel vulnerable, and will be pushed toward either geopolitical brinkmanship or submission to China s will.

They will spar with each other for another six weeks, then go to the brink of the purported cliff and see who blinks at the last moment.

This is partly because the strategy while bearing all the hallmarks of modern Chinese brinkmanship, including reliance on stealth, surprise, and a disregard for the risks of military escalation seeks to ensure that the initiative remains with China.

And in a way, I kind of like the sensation of it a lot better than I like actually standing on top of the cliff, wondering what to do.

But, on both sides of the Atlantic, the polarized politics of bravado and brinkmanship will be much in evidence.

Brinkmanship and broken agreements threaten to turn the referendum s technical and political difficulties into yet another disaster for the country.

The resulting political tensions led to a second Thirty Years War that brought Western civilization to the brink of collapse.

Europe is on the edge of an abyss, and will surely tumble into it unless Germany and France alters course.

The brinkmanship and bargaining that this approach encourages make it impossible to develop and present pan European visions to the public.

That will require a new brand of statecraft based on mutually beneficial cooperation not brinkmanship and deception.

It is very difficult for a central government to sit on the sidelines when the economy s key players are on the brink of collapse.

Moreover, nuclear brinkmanship is a particularly poor tactic, since Kim s behavior is now becoming fused in American minds with arguably the most serious strategic threat on the US agenda Iran s push to secure nuclear weapons of its own.

Iran and Syria, which have played a spoiler role in Iraq up to now, may also now be anxious to find a way to pull the country back from the brink.

CAMBRIDGE As the world economy tumbles off the edge of a precipice, critics of the economics profession are raising questions about its complicity in the current crisis.

For some, it is five minutes to midnight for others, Europe is a car accelerating towards the edge of a cliff.

Natural selection also explains many basic revulsions, such as the horrid smell of rotting meat, or fears, such as the fear of snakes or standing close to the edge of a cliff.

Yet the consequences of our individual actions are typically so far removed from our daily awareness that we can go right over the cliff without even knowing it.

The possibility of military intervention in Syria, together with the deteriorating situation in Egypt since the army s coup, has placed the region on a razor s edge.