Turkey, the Kurds, and Northern Syria: Early Impressions

Sunday, October 13, 2019

It's been a snowy couple of weeks, on and off, up here at the Borderlands Lodge this October. Normally the snow doesn't start sticking until November, but this year they came early. The bike and hiking trails are snowy and muddy, but we're doing the best that we can. The upper peaks have been frosted since the end of September. 

On the trail up to Storm Castle Peak. 

But of course life is simpler here in the northern Rockies. Given the state of the world these days, we're simply grateful to have the opportunities to lead our quiet lives in peace.




Not everyone can say that these days, especially in northern Syria.

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There's been a lot of chatter in recent days over the Trump administration's decision to give Turkey the green light to invade northern Syria. What's going on? 

I have a few thoughts on these developments. 

Review of Elena Campbell's "The Muslim Question and Russian Imperial Governance"

Friday, October 4, 2019

Below you'll find another book I've reviewed in recent years. Elena Campbell's Muslim Question was one of a series of books that came out about Muslims in Russia in 2014. 

This was originally printed in the Russian Review, Vol. 75/1, January, 2016, 155-6. 

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Elena I. Campbell’s The Muslim Question and Russian Imperial Governance is the latest of several books to be published over the past fifteen years that deal with the issue of Muslim administration in imperial Russia from the perspective of tsarist authorities.  Campbell draws upon several of these studies to provide a thorough and well-organized discussion of Muslim-state interactions across the Russian Empire, focusing particularly upon the final decades of the imperial era.  The book draws upon an impressive array of state archival material, and in particular uses the reports produced by tsarist officials responsible for the administration of Muslims in the empire.