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There are many items in American foreign policy the Europeans do not agree, namely its tendency towards "strong world leadership". On the other hand, the Americans would prefer stronger Europe, namely in time of world's economic crisis when US defence expenditures are practically frozen, and when pre-emptive strategy by president Bush exhausted most of American sources. Even the Europeans feel that they should profile themselves as independent, strong power, but their Common Foreign and Security Policy is still more political declaration than really military strategy. Many security experts suggest that the Lisbon Treaty excludes NATO membership as far as questions concerning defence are concerned. NATO alliance still expects new strategy that ought to be approved in December 2010. The authors predict the necessity to strengthen the so-called Second Pillar of the EU, as the United States are going to be more oriented towards cooperation with Japan, South Korea and Australia. We must bear it in mind, drawing up long-term visions of Czech Security policy.

It is not too often we could meet such a comprehensive monograph, dealing with security problems. Among such books belongs a book by Jan Eichler, with the same title, published by Charles University Prague, 2007. The most relevant chapter, Wars waged by the U.S. and its allies after the start of global terrorism, offers a provocative question, whether democratic nations, indirectly and unintentionally, gave rise to the upsurge of antipathy amongst the states with different political constitution, resulting in acts of terror? The ambiguous assessments of American wars in Afghanistan and Iraq seem to support author?s view. According to the reviewer, dr. A. Rašek, the author is wrong about the role land forces after the RMA?Revolution in Military Affairs. Without ground forces we are not able to win today?s asymmetrical warfare. The large part of book deals with conflicts not very familiar in the Czech Republic: Ethiopian-Eritrean war, disturbances in Somalia (operation Restore Hope), Burundi, Rwanda, Congo, Sierra Leone, Srí Lanka, Cashmere, Nepal, Haiti, Bolivia, and Colombia.

This opening study is written by two authors, members of Centre for Social and Economic Strategies, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University Prague, which is an interdisciplinary research and education unit engaged in the development of theory, methodology and practice of exploring possible futures, and the application of analyses and forecasts in decision making. The authors propose to supplement prognostic scenarios by the so-called wild cards that represent something unpredictable, extra players or actors taking part in a global politics. They compare wild cards of 2001 with the present-day situation, and then predict state of affairs till 2040, among others, the islamisation of Europe and hispanisation of the United States. The purpose of this is to promote dialogues between military and security experts, politicians, civil servants, civil sector activists, as well as individual citizens.

This operation was led by Germany, and made up of elements contributed by twenty EU nations; as well as Turkey and Switzerland. The EU deployed FHQ in Kinshasa and simultaneously kept the over-the-horizon force in Gabon, in order to ensure a deterrent capacity and to avoid unnecessary heavy military presence in Kinshasa. After Operation Althea in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the EUFOR RD Congo was a second EU largest military operation, involving a total of almost 3,000 soldiers and officers). The co-operation with MONUC was decisive in containing the potential spread of violence at a particularly sensitive moment in the election process. The operation demonstrated the EU ability to successfully conduct medium scale autonomous multinational operations within a planned time frame under the UN mandate. The views expressed in this assessment are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of EU Military Structure or the Czech Ministry of Defence. All information and data for this paper were drawn from unclassified sources.

The study analyzes the key features of Russian policies in the late 2000s and their prospective developments. It is above all the rise of Russia's economic power, boosted by the favourable rising trend of energy prices (oil and gas) that has helped to resume again the position of one of the key world powers, obsessively pursuing its geopolitical interests in a new emerging multipolar world. This also determines its relations with other major global actors, e.g. the U.S., the EU, and China (outlined in this article). As far as military budget is concerned, it is increasing. Russia has overcome a long period of stagnancy. After 2007, they re-established strategical patrol flights off Russian territory; great effort is aimed at power projection, as a means to secure natural resources beyond Russian boarders. The study is closed by Russia's geopolitical prospects till the year 2020. and its Anticipated Development

The recent public poll "Transatlantic Trends" indicates descending popularity of NATO among new member nations. The author (among others, the former deputy to the Slovakian National Assembly and the Council of Europe) calls upon discussion on this topic. He reminds that the primary purpose of the so-called Visegrad Group (V4-the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia) was to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. He offers his views on such a diverse and stimulating array of Euro-Atlantic defence and security related issues, related to the building of new European security architecture. We must bear in mind that no one can expect any single nation, even including the only remaining world superpower, to address all the diverse and transnational risks of the 21st century alone. Therefore, the EU/ V4 need to keep ties with NATO as NATO links US global power to the regional capabilities of the European allies.

This second and closing part of this security study covers decades before the half of this century. The leading role in prevention and fight against armed conflicts will rest namely upon intelligence services. It is also expected the mass use of nonlethal weapons. The US will stay as the only leading superpower, minority expects a plurality model, i.e. the US will be only first among the equals. Some predicts the collapse of the EU. The Army of the Czech Republic ought to achieve full operational potential around the year 2012. It will take part in multinational missions. The Alliance armies should have 8 per cent of their capacities fully operable abroad. Under the preventive strategy, the regions of their prospective deployment will be in bordering countries around Europe, areas around the Eastern Mediterranean, or in the Far East. More or less, one problem remains still open: whether foreign deployments of the ACR really correspond to the interests and needs of the Czech Republic.

The subject of this comprehensive study: the main features of global risk society can be embodied by ecology crises, global financial crises, threat of terrorism. The article is presented as a report to military community and audience, with the underlying focus on terrorism. The author is mapping the global future in the first two decades of this century. As a small country we must pay attention to the developments in the worlds leading powers: the U.S., China, Russia, last but not least, within the EU. Those themes also present individual headings of this study. He treats energy, demography, peace, security, good neighbourly relations, cooperation between states that are most desirable goals we want to reach. In a way, as the main actor of worlds security situation till 2020 is identified Islamist terrorism (radical Islamists, Al Qaeda). At the end Mr. Balabán recalls the former "Security Policy of the Czech Republic" released ten years ago, reminding us the necessity to be prepared for the worst scenarios.

The return of Russia as a power that begins again to partake in political agenda of present-day world raises the necessity to reflect its inner developments in the background of its recent history. There are six key factors that substantionally influence the position of Russia in the world: large sources of raw materials (pipelines); outstanding military capacities (the world's second nuclear potential); high level of general education; wide scientific and research base; permanent membership in UN Security Council and in the Group of Eight (G-8); deciding influence in the near neighbourhood. The study comes to the conclusion that Russia-in the horizon of 2020-will belong among world's leading actors, together with the US, the EU, China, and Islamic world. Russia will be able to of enforce its foreign and security goals, both in post-Soviet areas and in key regions in Europe, Asia and in the Great Near East. As such, it will probably get into conflict with the US. The priority tasks of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation will rest on maintaining nuclear parity with the US and building capacities for asymmetrical operations.

Even after the Cold War, our world is full of local and international conflicts. There were dozens of wars, fringe clashes between local opposing groups in Africa, Asia and so on. Among them there were four wars of lager size, with more than thousands of deaths in each of them that could be characterized as international wars: Desert Storm 1991, Iraqi Freedom 2003, Allied Strength 1999, and Enduring Freedom 2001. Now we can look at them from a distance ...217 Problems tied with those large-scale wars have several levels: supranational (international) level and military level, being accompanied by paradoxes: international and political paradoxes and military ones. This influenced structures and methods of training and preparation of Australian, Britain and US forces. The lessons were embedded into their military concepts, rules and regulations, e.g. Complex Warfighting (Australia), Future Land Operating Concept (UK), Field Manual: Interim Counterinsurgency Operations (US). New roles of military forces, global and local implications, ought to be embedded also into the structures and concepts of the Army of the Czech Republic, concludes the author.

Antiballistic defence systems could be defined as a secondary defensive response to ballistic threats, against existing, projected or planned ballistic military hardware. In a way, it is a sort of deterrence weapon, because such defence discourages opponents form the development of offensive missiles. The author of this article, the former deputy defence minister, Maj-Gen. (ret), specifies three relevant antimissiles system: ALTBM-NATO Active Layered Theatre Ballistic Missile Defence; NATO MD-NATO Missile Defence; and USA MD-USA Missile Defence. The purpose of American antiballistic defence is to counterbalance potential strokes by limited numbers of ballistic missiles, blasted off from both enemy and rogue states and those launched by accident. Allegedly, the Iranians are developing ballistic missiles with the range of 4,000 km. With the reference to the fact that the distance Prague-Teheran is about 3,400 km, and such missiles could constitute an eminent danger even for the Czech Republic, not only for the continental United States, this issue is widely discussed in Czech mass media.