For defence and security types, I'll be talking about whether the UK can afford to fight a war with General Sir Richard Barrons and @oliviaosullivan.bsky.social at Chatham House on 27th November. You can sign up here for online or in person: www.chathamhouse.org/events/all/o...

Delve deeper into your family tree by finding lost relatives who served in WWI. Ensure their service & sacrifice are never forgotten. Free access until 13th November. @findmypast.bsky.social findmypast.co.uk. T&Cs apply

😮 Norway finds out that its electric busses - produced by a Chinese firm - can be remotely controlled from China! The good news of this is that the Norwegians realised this because they did a cybersecurity test. We need to think about, and test, stuff like this more. www.focus.de/panorama/wel...

Watching Homes under the Hammer. Somewhere in this image are a couple of housebuyers. Repost if you see them but no spoilers.

I did a lecture on the impact of Brexit on British politics. Watch it here if you're really bored www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztqL...

"We knew in 2011 when #Libya was collapsing that we needed to hurry up…they came with huge amounts of #arms: convoys of arms … It was like a huge supermarket of arms for free … The Secretary-General requested a draft #strategy" #Sahel @oxunipress.bsky.social @egmontinstitute.bsky.social

I've only just been able to watch this, as I was teaching at the time, but it's excellent. Clear-eyed, challenging & wide-ranging, it grapples with hard questions about the stakes of the war, what Britons are willing to pay, the reliability of NATO & who supplies new weapons. Well worth watching.

This should be a resigning matter for the VC. Senior leadership forgot the primary purpose of a university: to generate new knowledge.

Another 'financial crash imminent' warning...these valuations are insane.

Infuriatingly, this repeats the historically illiterate: This hasn't happened since Labour replaced the Liberals. Only nothing has replaced anything. There's been some striking opinion polls and midterm results, years from an election. The last time what we are seeing happened was actually 1981. 1/3

People are very judgy about the celebrities in the Traitors, but if your whole life you're the centre of attention, having to focus on other people and read their social cues must be incredibly difficult.

FGS, why do I ever bother with trains? Could have driven to London and back for cheaper and be home by now. Instead, the morning train was cancelled and the one back appears to have broken down.

I know this is clickbait, but it needs to be rebuffed: Russia doesn't want a ceasefire or to settle. If you're really aware of the limits of US power, you'll know you can't wish that away... www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

If you have any excellent Masters students looking to do a PhD, do send them our way at the OU, funding available! www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DPD380/g...

Thank you, Dan, for your review! And thanks again to our wonderful contributors, @byrnealice.bsky.social Lori Maguire, Adrien Rodd, Bent Boel, Christian Turner, @ameliahadfield1.bsky.social @thibaudharrois.bsky.social

An OpenAI executive said GPT-5 found solutions to 10 "previously unsolved" math problems when in reality all it did was find online references to places where people had already solved them techcrunch.com/2025/10/19/o...

Not great....

Strong refutation here...

Should Nick Watt really be revealing counter-espionage trade craft on Newsnight?

My Engelsberg Seminar — Great Crashes in History and Lessons for the Future My The Great Crashes book: www.amazon.co.uk/Great-Crashe... Watch at: youtu.be/5Gnes2wYc88?...

Anyone counted the Latvian team? I'm pretty sure there were 15 of them in their own box at one point.

Finally. Let’s hope this is taken seriously. ‘Britain's domestic spy agency MI5 issued a rare public warning to members of parliament on Monday that they are being targeted by spies from China, Russia and Iran in an attempt to undermine the country's democracy.’ www.reuters.com/world/uk/uks...

Every academic career is built on rejection, but we don’t show it. 
CVs list publications, grants & awards, not rejected manuscripts, unfunded proposals, or failures. 
But those invisible rejections shape us more than our successes ever do. 👉 catherineeunicedevries.substack.com/p/fail-bette... 🧵

The British Army have had more number one singles in Ireland (one) than Aslan, The Corrs, Van Morrison, or The Cranberries (zero).

Warned against this on a security Roundtable @mybisa.bsky.social. Critical scholars increasingly engaging in the sort of gatekeeping positivists used to employ. Big dept like Warwick claiming singular critical identity. Radical idea: why not pick the finest scholar? www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DOZ241/p...

Fascinating how @thetimes.com reports higher education. Another way of putting this is that 80% of graduates are better off for having gone to uni...

Interesting, but I think the core question in deterrence is: what does the target value more than what you want to dissuade it from doing?

Back in the summer I took part in the Engelsberg Seminar in Sweden. Here are a series of interviews with speakers, starting with mine. The interviewer is @niklasekdal.bsky.social

This is the reality of UKHE. Well-meaning people ask why we're not capitalising on Trump's hostile environment and inviting global talent to UK...because the sector is an absolute bin fire.

This whole obsession with "too many people going to uni" is such a classic example of the parochialism of UK policymaking. No one bothers to ask why the % here is lower than in most other developed countries or whether that might be relevant.

I've lived through 3 or 4. Has the feel of a classic bubble. What can we do to ensure, when it collapses, it doesn't hit the wider economy?

"I hear again and again that the Israelis – the Jews – had it coming. Knowing allusions to Jewish influence, Jewish power. Stereotypes of Jewish cruelty." Written before today's attack on a Manchester synagogue. It's the kind of piece I never thought I'd write. www.newstatesman.com/internationa...

Avoiding the Taiwan Strait doesn’t lower risk, it validates Beijing’s claim. Freedom of navigation matters most where it’s contested.

Reports in the Sunday Times and in The Times on Saturday that the speaker of the House of Commons was “weighing up” initiating a private prosecution of two men who were suspected by MPs of spying for China strike me as bizarre. rozenberg.substack.com/p/i-spy-stra...

It is 20 years since Conor Gearty gave the Hamlyn Lectures on Can Human Rights Survive? As a mark of respect following the dreadful news of his, Cambridge University Press & Assessment has made these lectures Open Access for the remainder of the year. You can find them here: lnkd.in/e5Xrt2G5

My latest report from DSEI, detailing options for a new assault rifle for the British Armed Forces to replace the unloved SA80: Pop culture references of the day: Rogue Trooper and Molesworth 💪

Just had an article rejected because one reviewer was peeved it didn't set out independent and dependent variables. Positivism lives!

Musk is essentially acting as a hate preacher. The government responded robustly to them 2 decades ago. They should do the same again.

There's a sinister undertone to these drip-fed utterances. It shows a profound lack of understanding of how research operates in UKHE - and the radical and destructive effects reducing research could have on the whole mission of higher education. www.timeshighereducation.com/news/uk-univ...

This guy needs to be arrested...

Walking through central London with the kids, bumped into a protest. Rather worrying seeing lots of messages scrawled on the pavement directly threatening Starmer saying 'we know where you live'. Imported US nonsense which is very dangerous.

See also Peter Mandelson and Michael Gove...

Social and political phenomena rarely have single-cause explanations. Qualitative Comparative Analysis #QCA offers a structured approach to causal complexity. On Sep 17, @isanet.bsky.social hosts a free virtual introduction to the method of #QCA - sign up here: buff.ly/fMK5s2L

This isn't "just" Shaheds on Poland It's jamming v/d Leyen and German general's planes It's bombing the EU HQ in Kyiv It's bombing Ukr civilians every day and night with 800+ drones and missiles AND THIS IS JUST LAST WEEK.

Ah, shoot. Just finished King & Conqueror. After all the other historical liberties I was kind of hoping Harold was gonna win but no, the baddies still did.

Oh fiddlesticks. If I had one ambition, it was to appear on this one day with Bragg. Eternally jealous of those who have.

And just like that, a 100 books on the new authoritarian international order have a cover...

Some thoughts from me on one of the most extraordinary breakdowns in relations between leaders in recent times.

Its time to ensure the legitimate concerns of ethnic minorities in Britain – about a concerted effort to dissolve foundational social norms against racism + deny our status as equal citizens – are heard too We should *reject* excessive pessimism about pushing bsck www.easterneye.biz/british-ethn...

Chatham House experts and researchers are available to follow on Bluesky. Connect with our experts here and follow them for their analysis on key international events and global trends. ⬇️ go.bsky.app/UKHXrog