Journal Entry #26
NEW YORK, October 31—A reader (and a new and generous supporter) wrote just yesterday to raise a matter that comes regularly to mind these past few months. “I would very much appreciate an update regarding your current thinking about the…
Trump Goes to Asia—but the Pentagon Gets There First
Mattis confirms policy with Manila, Tokyo, and Seoul before the president’s first trip across the Pacific. At the end of this week our president is to set off on an 11–day sweep through Asia—five nations plus two regional forums, one…
The Catalan crisis: Is the contemporary nation-state in jeopardy?
Spain’s clumsy government has made a difficult situation worse. That doesn’t mean the nation should be dismembered We reach a grim moment in the crisis between Catalonia and the Spanish state. And it has come hard and fast since late…
Dumb and dumber: Trump’s foreign policy repeats decades of American mistakes
Trump’s foreign policy is entirely incoherent. But it’s just a stupider continuation of everything since 1945 Topic of the week seems to be Donald Trump’s foreign policy. This is about right. Annual reviews of a president’s record managing America’s conduct…
Journal Entry #25
NORFOLK, CONN., October 22—This is a Journal entry with a special purpose. As I publish it I am taking a new turn, and it seems to me right to explain to readers—of this Journal, of my columns—what I mean and…
Donald Trump Has Had a Lot of Help in Sabotaging the Iran Deal
Washington is just not equipped to negotiate its way into the 21st century. In a midday speech on Friday, President Trump fulfilled another of his campaign promises—the kind one wishes he would fail to keep. As widely reported over the…
Making history safe again: What Ken Burns gets wrong about Vietnam
Historian Christian Appy: Vietnam was not a “tragic misunderstanding” but a campaign of “imperial aggression” Three questions came to mind when news arrived that “The Vietnam War,” the latest documentary film from Ken Burns (co-directed with Lynn Novick), would air…
Cold War Illusions: Losing Friends
Just before the November 2016 elections, I was invited to share lunch at a place called Packer’s Corner, a tiny hamlet in southeastern Vermont. I was instantly intrigued. If “faded glory” fairly describes the place now, Packer’s Corner et ses…
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