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March 28, 2009 Let’s Put Bylines on Our ‘National’ Intelligence Estimates Charles Freeman's withdrawal from his appointment as the chairman of the National Intelligence Council (NIC) offers an opportunity to assess whether personal views should have any role in in... March 27, 2009 Obama Gets It Right, Mostly, With His Plan for Afghanistan President Obama outlined his new Afghanistan-Pakistan policy today, and for the most part, got it right. He laid out a specific strategic objective, "to disrupt, dismantle and defeat Al Qaeda --... March 26, 2009 The American Counter-Revolution The question posed by social scientist Charles Murray at the American Enterprise Institute’s annual dinner this month could hardly have been simpler: Do Americans want the United States to... March 26, 2009 The U.N.’s ‘Alliance of Civilizations’ President Obama is expected to travel early next month to Istanbul, where he will attend a meeting of a United Nations-spawned outfit called the Alliance of Civilizations. Under that grand title,... March 26, 2009 Bin Laden’s Somali Gambit Last week, al-Qaeda chieftain Usama bin Laden interjected himself yet once again into the ongoing conflict in the territory of the former Somali Democratic Republic. On closer examination, the mo... March 24, 2009 CAIR’s Well-Deserved Expulsion A week ago, the FBI officially announced that it has cut ties with the Council on American-Islamic Relations. The self-styled civil-rights organization is characteristically squawking, but the FB... March 20, 2009 In Overture to Iran, Obama Negotiates Without Leverage President Obama unveiled the first part of his Iranian policy directly to ... the Iranian People. It was a good opening pitch, insofar as it went. But Iran is playing hardball, so the important t... March 19, 2009 Does The U.N. Really Matter? His travels apparently bankrolled in part by Iran, his excellency the president of the United Nations General Assembly, Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann, recently took a three-week trip to Syria, F... March 18, 2009 Talking with the Mullahs President Obama keeps telling us that he wants to sit down and talk with Iran’s ruling mullahs, as if this would be a drastic change from the past. But the Bush administration negotiated ex... March 16, 2009 The Administration Kowtows Over the last three weeks, the Obama administration has sent three clear signals to the Chinese leadership. First came the news that Chas Freeman would chair the National Intelligence Co... March 16, 2009 Which Way Will the Wind Blow From Damascus? Syrian President Bashar Assad has become the hottest ticket in the world, from Washington to Paris and from Riyadh to Cairo. Everybody wants to meet him, be seen with him and get on his good side... March 15, 2009 The Appeasers They like to call themselves “realists,” but their proper name is “appeasers.” They follow in the hollow footsteps of Neville Chamberlain, who signed an agreement wi... March 12, 2009 Money to Burn? This month, there was an “International Conference in Support of the People and Economy of Darfur,” and billions of dollars were raised not just from America and Europe but also from... March 12, 2009 The Chinese Navy’s Somali Cruise by Dr. Peter Pham Since the beginning of January, three vessels of China's People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) - the Guangzhou-class destroyer Wuhan... March 12, 2009 The U.N.’s Year Of Libya At a White House meeting on Tuesday, President Obama and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon were full of praise for a U.S.-U.N. partnership, which Obama envisions as "extraordinarily co... March 10, 2009 The Syria-Iran Alliance In recent years, a number of erroneous notions have been re-injected into the policy discourse on the thirty-year old alliance between Syria and Iran. Statements such as "prying Syria away from I... March 10, 2009 The Attack on Syria’s al-Kibar Nuclear Facility Israel's September 6, 2007, attack on Syria's al-Kibar nuclear facility surprised the world—Syria most of all. The operation, executed by the Israeli Air Force (IAF), was reminisc... March 5, 2009 Can We Drill Our Way to Energy Security? March 5, 2009 Please Squeeze the Mullahs President Bush was under no illusions about the threat a nuclear-armed, militant Islamist regime in Tehran would pose. But during two terms in the White House, he took no serious steps to prevent... March 5, 2009 Can We Give To Gaza Without Giving To Hamas? If stuffing billions worth of aid into the Palestinian territories could end Islamist terrorism out of Gaza, it might be worth the money. That seems to be President Obama's gamble, with Secr... March 4, 2009 Here We Go Again For decades, Democratic and Republican administrations have attempted to cajole the terrorist-supporting Alawite regime in Damascus away from its anti-Israeli and anti-American positions. Since t... March 4, 2009 Don’t Let Damascus Out of the Doghouse For years, the regime in Damascus has been an international pariah, given Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's support for terrorist groups Hamas and Hezbollah, his family's heavy-handed... March 4, 2009 Hillary Should Get on the Road to Damascus After decades of diplomacy in the Middle East, it seems there are two schools of thought on how to proceed. One school says a relations between two countries grows from the bottom up. Negotiation... March 1, 2009 Jihadi Penetration of Pakistan’s Armed Forces is at the Centre of All Concerns in Any New Strategy’ The deal between the Pakistan government and pro-Taliban forces in the Swat valley is an ominous portent of Pakistan's slide into jihadism, with strategic implications for India and other co... February 26, 2009 Dr. Fadl’s Complaint In the 20th century, communists waged a struggle for global dominance, but there were conflicts within their ranks as well — disputes over strategy, ideology, and doctrine. Bolsheviks fough... February 26, 2009 Obama The Appeaser? President Obama's broad scheme for foreign policy has been something of a puzzle, short on specifics and long on talk about forging alliances, extending hands and "engaging." In his... February 20, 2009 Why Do We Care Whether Iran Has Nuclear Weapons? It's official. Iran has enough enriched uranium for a nuclear bomb. It has a long-range missile capable of delivering that bomb. Now all it needs is the blueprint, which is usually complicat... February 19, 2009 Try Real ‘Change’ Toward North Korea Quick quiz on North Korea: Can you name a single democratic dissident currently active inside North Korea? Just one? Is there any North Korean equivalent to Myanmar's Aung San Suu K... February 18, 2009 Peace Processing 101 There’s an old joke about three guys stranded in the desert, dying of thirst. They have a can of water — but can’t open it. One guy, an engineer, uses a stick as a lever and a r... February 18, 2009 Jihad TV in Europe Thanks to Arab satellite companies, Hezbollah's al-Manar and Hamas's al-Aqsa TV stations can still beam their incitement and hatred into European living rooms, radicalizing Muslim immig... February 17, 2009 A Truth Commission? A growing chorus of critics is demanding the creation of a special commission to "investigate" the Bush administration's alleged abuses of power, especially prosecution of the war on terrori... February 15, 2009 Will Afghanistan Awake? U.S. Central Command recently announced it will be supporting an indigenous movement opposing al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan, similar to the Awakening movement that was central to turnin... February 12, 2009 Commerce Department Waives Syria Sanctions "We will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist." This was President Obama's inaugural offer last month to troublesome tyrants around the world. Most attention has focused on... January 23, 2009 Gaza Just One of Many Jihadi Fronts To Osama Bin Laden, the confrontation in Gaza is not a local national issue but part of what he coins as world jihad against the kaffirs (infidels), or more precisely, the "Crusader-Zion... January 12, 2009 A Third Lebanon War? While the Gaza war enters its third week, the question of a second front remains very accurate. Even though lots of experts have asserted that Hezbollah would not enter the war at this point, som... December 31, 2008 Shadow of Iran Looms Large Over Gaza The Israeli air raids on Hamas's infrastructure along with troop movements around Gaza's enclave and the shelling of Israel by the jihadist organization are both troubling developments... December 31, 2008 Guinea Avoids the Deluge — At Least for Now More than two years ago, I devoted a column in this series to the relatively obscure West African nation of Guinea which holds more than half of the world's reserves of bauxite (bauxite ore... December 18, 2008 Where We Fight It's of little consequence to most of us what historians of the future will say about George W. Bush. More important is whether there will be historians in the future who can work in freedom... December 11, 2008 Iran’s Power At The United Nations With Iran racing down the homestretch toward a nuclear bomb, the United Nations Security Council has spent more than two years expressing "serious concern." By now, Iran is under U.N. sanctions,... December 8, 2008 The Role of Consensus in the Contemporary Struggle for Islam Jordan's King Abdullah II launched an ambitious project in November 2004 designed to address some of the thorniest theological issues currently facing Muslims. The project, known as the "Amman Message," expressly holds that non-Muslims can reasonably "expect certain things from Muslims" in the contemporary context, in which Muslims and non-Muslims have unprecedented contact.[i] The Amman Message was self-consciously launched against the backdrop of the "global war on terror," where predominantly stateless terror networks claiming allegiance to Islam have managed to drastically alter the geopolitical landscape. December 1, 2008 Syria Sets its Traps for the Obama Administration In approaching Syria, the new administration will have to navigate carefully amidst myths, fantasies, and traps laid not just by the Syrians, but also by credulous experts here in the United States. The best way to do so is to assess soberly the Syrian regime's nature, interests, priorities, and instruments as well as the history of diplomatic engagement with it. October 30, 2008 Afghan Awakening IN SEPTEMBER of 2008, Admiral Michael Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, made a remarkable statement. He said, "I'm not convinced we're winning in Afghanistan. I am conv... October 27, 2008 It is Clutch Time for Syria Time is running out for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. He will have to decide in the next few weeks whether his overture to the West is genuine or not. To Assad's credit a slew of events... October 17, 2008 Egypt: Evolution Theory Egyptian politics are in a state of stagnation. Despite numerous promises of reform in recent years, the government of president Hosni Mubarak has failed to embark upon a genuine opening of the political system, and hopes for reforms have faded. October 16, 2008 Profile of an Ideologue, Abu Yahya al-Libi October 16, 2008 Welcome to Hard Times Just what we needed: In the midst of a global war to defend the West from radical jihadists, we get a global financial crisis caused by the incompetence and/or corruption of Washington and Wall S... October 16, 2008 Counting America’s Successes And you tell me over and over and over and over again my friend, Ah, you don't believe we're on the eve of destruction. No, that's not a line from the 2008... October 11, 2008 Wake Up to Iran’s Dark Dream to Disable U.S. Which world leader is on record musing about "a world without America" — a goal he calls "attainable"? Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Until recently, it was possible to bel... October 11, 2008 The U.N.’s Man of Mystery "I don't trust you, and I also question your integrity." Thus did Maurice Strong offer me a seat on his living room sofa. Often described as an "international man of mystery," Mr. S... October 9, 2008 Bordering On Tyranny Set on the northern bank of the muddy Tumen River, this Chinese border town has one of the saddest backdrops in the world. Just across the river lies North Korea. It is so close that from a room...

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