Missed Milestones
Evaluating The Last Four Years in the EAP Region and Unseized Opportunities Under President Trump
Soviet empire
The Real War in ‘Syria’ and the Strategy for Long-Term Victory
Of course I loathe Assad. And of course I despise the Obamans for that phony red line and the subsequent retreat-and-bogus-Russian-deal. But just carrying out vengeance against Assad isn’t...
Op-eds
Analysis: To confront Iran’s jingoism and domestic repression, change its regime
The self-immolation death of an Iranian Arab last week in the province of Khuzestan offers a window onto the court of a neglected alternative to an Iran on the brink of nuclear weapons breakout:...
Op-eds
The Citizen’s Guide to Regime Change
All of a sudden, it’s OK to talk seriously about regime change in Iran and even elsewhere. It had been a taboo subject since the final years of the G.W. Bush administration, aside fro...
Op-eds
Khamenei Spits in Our Face Again—and We Pay for the Pleasure
He did it again, as we should have expected. Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei walked us right up to the finish line, spat on us, and walked away. Months and months of secret an...
Op-eds
The Power-Hungry vs. the War-Weary
Russia’s Vladimir Putin, seething over the collapse of the Soviet Empire, wants to become the hegemon of Eurasia — at least. Iran’s Ali Khamenei, outraged by the...
Op-eds
Dare We Say It? The Mullahs Must Go
Sanctions and diplomacy have thus far failed to induce the Iranian regime to cease its nuclear weapons program. We shouldn’t be surprised by this. Top Iranian leaders, from Supreme Leader A...
Op-eds
Remembering The Invasion of Grenada 30 Years On
One night in late October, 1983, I listened to a BBC short wave broadcast reporting that the United States was about to invade Grenada. I chuckled, said to myself, “Crazy Brits,...
Op-eds
The New War Against America
Last January, President Obama went over to the Pentagon to announce deep cuts in defense. He took the occasion to proclaim: “Even as our troops continue to fight in Afghanistan, the tide of...
Op-eds
When Did the War Start? Or Did It?
Almost everything you read about the “increasing tension” between Iran and the United States revolves around the rhetorical question, “will there be a war?” Whether it&rsq...
Op-eds
You Cannot Reform a Totalitarian (You’ve Got to Defeat Him)
Back when I was even younger, and living in Rome, the main topic of conversation was of course Communism. Italy had the largest Communist Party outside the Soviet Union, and it was forever on the...
Op-eds
Why Tyrants Fall
What spells the doom of dictators? Nobody really knows, and there are so many “whats” that the whole subject defies quantification. Coups and assassinations, revolutions,...
Op-eds
The New, Neoconservative, New York Times
At first I thought it was an anomaly, a personal thing. One New York Times columnist has an epiphany. But now there are two of them, two very liberal Tim...
Op-eds
It’s a Real War, Stupid. A Big War. A Worthy Challenge for America
If we are going to win in the Middle East, we have to get the context right. As I wrote in The War Against the Terror Masters, long before the invasion of Iraq, we cannot just “do&rdq...
Op-eds
The War with Syria
So the president finally swallowed hard and pronounced the three words: “Assad must go.” Well, not exactly. That would have been too simple....
Op-eds
The Myths of Oslo
The more I look at the Oslo massacre, the more I am struck by how archaic it all is. The killer fancies himself a noble defender of a Western world that no longer exists, and has not existed, rea...
Op-eds
How To Make Revolution Work
I am a big fan of Walter Russell Mead, and his recent essay on “The Conservative Revolutionary” shows him in top form. Mead is one of the few who understands that human history...
Op-eds
The Wimp Goes to War
I was right to worry about what the president might do to demonstrate his virility on the international stage, and the confusion surrounding just about everything having to do with the Libya thin...
Op-eds
China: The First Mature Fascist State
In 2002, I speculated that China may be something we have never seen before: a mature fascist state. Recent events there, especially the mass rage in response to Western criticism, seem to confir...
Op-eds
Revolution, Iranian and Otherwise
Tell the truth: you don’t really know what a revolution looks like, do you? Chances are that if anybody asked you, you’d conjure up some picture including the storming of the B...