Will Trump Break the Post–Cold War Order?
Much will depend on whom he surrounds himself with. But at least he’s put the question on the table. The presidency of Donald J. Trump: One still emits a quiet gasp when uttering the phrase. It will take time to…
The Filipino President Just Set Off a Diplomatic Earthquake
Rodrigo Duterte’s tilt toward China is a fundamental shift in the Western Pacific power balance. It is one thing for a leader such as Vladimir Putin to send all of Washington and the media clerks serving it into a dither—as…
Meet the Man Who Should Be the Next Secretary of State
Former ambassador to Saudi Arabia Chas Freeman is that rare thing, an honest and wise diplomat—which is why he’ll probably never be appointed. Late this past summer, when I mentioned to Andrew Bacevich that I had interviewed Chas Freeman and…
The Russian Blitzkrieg on Aleppo Is a Direct Challenge to Washington
The Syrian cease-fire was already in tatters. But the new offensive is also early preparation for a hawkish Clinton presidency. What are we to make of events in Syria now that Secretary of State Kerry’s latest (and very possibly last)…
John Kerry’s last hurrah: With the Syrian cease-fire, the secretary of state takes a parting swipe at Russophobia
The cease-fire ends his successful skirmish with the Pentagon, but the war will grind on long after Kerry is gone Secretary of State John Kerry now gives us another “cessation of hostilities” agreement — a not-quite-cease-fire — as signed with…
War in the media age: Hysteria over Trump’s supposed Russian ties made headlines, but the “story” is remarkably flimsy
A case study in how a co-opted press manufactures foreign policy consent From one week to the next, I note with mounting anxiety the media’s habit of using innuendo, loaded suggestion, assemblages of proximate facts, implication short of assertion and omission…
About those “experts”: Take a close look at the foreign policy insiders denouncing Trump
The possibility of a true outsider upending Washington’s unspoken consensus has thrown elites into hysteria This latest open letter from 50 Republican “national security experts,” wherein Donald Trump is denounced as “dangerous” among many other things, is simply too much. One does…
Clinton, Gen. Allen and alarmist declarations: The media must call out leaders for their dangerous fictions
A couple of remarkable things got said on television last Sunday morning. Both seemed to have slipped into the record without much comment. Let us keep the record straight, then — the never-ending task when you have a corporatized press…
Shades of the Cold War: How the DNC fabricated a Russian hacker conspiracy to deflect blame for its email scandal
Now wait a minute, all you upper-case “D” Democrats. A flood light suddenly shines on your party apparatus, revealing its grossly corrupt machinations to fix the primary process and sink the Sanders campaign, and within a day you are on…
Corporate media’s Turkey spin: “Attempted coup” bears the marks of an authoritarian power grab orchestrated by Erdoğan
Last week’s events in Turkey leave astute observers with more questions than answers Recip Tayyip Erdoğan has to be the most exotic political figure to come down the pike in who can say how long. “Tinpot” is too good a…
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