George Szamuely discusses today's surprise signing in Washington, D.C. of a peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and explains the geopolitical significance of the event.

George Szamuely and Peter Lavelle discuss Russia's announcement that it would henceforth no longer abide by the self-imposed moratorium on intermediate-range missile deployments, and reflect on the Western media's strange pretense that the defunct INF Treaty is still in place.

George Szamuely discusses the growing legal and political campaign against Bosnian Republika Srpska President Milorad Dodik, and wonders whether NATO is ready to step in as a way of removing Russian influence from the Balkans once and for all.

Each week, The Gaggle Book Club recommends a book for Gagglers to read and—most important—uploads a pdf version of it.

Our practice is that we do not vouch for the reliability or accuracy of any book we recommend. Still less, do we necessarily agree with a recommended book's central arguments. However, any book we recommend will be of undoubted interest and intellectual importance.

Today's book club selection is “The Battle for Spain: The Spanish Civil War 1936–1939 by Antony Beevor. Published in 2006, Beevor's book is a lively recounting of the key events that led from the political crisis triggered by the collapse of the Spanish monarchy to the brutal civil war and finally to the nearly-four decade dictatorship of General Francisco Franco. Readability and accessibility is what you would expect from Beevor's books, and this one does not disappoint.

As Beevor tells it, Spain at the turn of the 20th century was still a very poor, undeveloped country. While industrialization had started to transform cities such as ...