Nicaragua’s charade at the ICJ
The bitter irony is that it is the country’s far-left leadership, aligned with the dictatorships in Venezuela and Cuba, that should be in the dock.
Iran–Contra affair
Forget the Bomb and Help Iranians Fight Their Regime
All the other options have failed.
Op-eds
Hostages and a Nuclear Illusion
Biden’s appeasement actually increases the chance that Iran will build a bomb.
Op-eds
The White House Must Close Its Hostage Bazaar With Iran And Russia
The setting was dramatic and the stakes were high. In the summer of 1987, millions of Americans tuned into the Iran-Contra hearings to witness Secretary of State George Shultz deliver a master class on...
Op-eds
The CIA, Post-Obama
When the new casts out the old, an incoming administration has the opportunity to review its predecessor’s approach to the Central Intelligence Agency. When this is done, the foc...
Op-eds
The Death Of Dewey Clarridge
In the summer of 1981, I was Special Advisor to Secretary of State Alexander Haig, and he asked me to try to find out what the CIA was up to in Salvador and Nicaragua. “I’m afra...
Op-eds
CIA Bides its Time
The CIA’s Directorate of Operations doesn’t have an acute memory. But it does have durable institutional sentiments. So here’s a guess: In a few years, few operatives in the cla...
Op-eds
It’s Not The Deal, But The Dealing, That’s So Dangerous
We have swapped four Taliban terrorists, plus a member of the murderous Haqqani Group, for a kidnapped American Army soldier, Bowe Bergdahl. No one should be shocked that we made this de...
Op-eds
You Don’t Like Dealing With Terrorists? Bring Them Down.
I was in the room in 1985 during the US/Iran/Israel negotiations that eventually led to Iran-Contra, and while I had no authority to make commitments for the American Government, I had plenty of...
Op-eds
Releasing Prisoners, Appeasing Enemies
Both the Israeli release of more than a hundred Palestinian killers and the American release of five Taliban killers from Guantanamo are U.S. policy decisions, so it’s fair to treat t...
Op-eds
In Iran, Two Bombing Suspects Run for President
After disqualifying a number of presidential candidates from the June 14 elections, Iran's Guardian Council has pared the list down to eight. Remarkably, two of the remaining candidates --...
Op-eds
Gary Sick, Discredited but Honored
The so-called "October Surprise" plot that briefly enthralled the American public twenty years ago is one of the most influential political conspiracy theories in U.S. history. As the story goes,...
Op-eds
The Shuttered White House and Its Fantasies
I know exactly what is going on inside the Obama White House; the outside world has been banned and only the true believers are welcome. This has very little to do with the many unique f...
Op-eds
To Meet Or Not To Meet?
Amidst Obama's folly, can we finally pronounce Bush's Iran policy a disaster?
Op-eds
We’ve Been Talking to Iran for 30 Years
The Obama administration's talks with Iran-set to take place tomorrow in Geneva-are accompanied by an almost universally accepted misconception: that previous American administrations refused to ne...
Op-eds
We’ve Been Talking to Iran for 30 Years
The Obama administration's talks with Iran-set to take place tomorrow in Geneva-are accompanied by an alm...
Op-eds
The Intelligence Mess
(Editor's note: This article first appeared in April 2004.) Intelligence-gathering is something of a square peg in the round hole of contemporary political morality. It is about unearthing t...
Op-eds
Rolling Smear
Co-Authored with Mark R. Levin In a screed Rolling Stone is passing off as journalism, James Bamford becomes the latest in a growing crowd of hacks to smear our friend Michael L...