Strategic Patience Cairo ReviewAmbassador Ryan Crocker spent a four-decade diplomatic career in the Islamic World, serving as U.S. envoy in Kabul, Baghdad, Islamabad, Damascus, Kuwait City, and Beirut and receiving honors such as the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He speaks with Managing Editor Scott MacLeod about America’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, handling the crises over Syria and Iran, and Washington’s foreign policy failings.Read More
Dealing With IranReza MarashiPresident Barack Obama entered office in 2009 calling for a new approach to diplomacy with Iran. Yet, as he begins his second term, the U.S. and Iran are on the brink of a conflict that could engulf the world. A Memo to the President on how America can avoid war.Read More
What's New in the Gaza-Israel BattleRami G. KhouriMore killing and destruction will not resolve this conflict, but a lack of a fair and negotiated resolution also means that more killing and destruction are inevitable. Read More
There Will Be No Civil War in LebanonRami G. KhouriThe political tensions and a handful of local clashes following the assassination last Friday of Internal Security Forces Intelligence Bureau head Brigadier General Wissam al-Hassan reflected a tragic but rather routine sequence of sentiments and events in this country, where political assassinations have occurred regularly for half a century. Read More
Drone WarsMichael Burnam-Fink Meet the Predator, the unmanned attack aircraft that is defining warfare in the post-Cold War era. Initially deemed useless by the Pentagon and Central Intelligence Agency, it has become America’s weapon of choice in the War on Terror. With the creation of a new military bureaucracy dependent on identifying
and striking new enemies, will Predator missions ever end?Read More
Curtains For Bin Laden’s Freak ShowScott MacLeodThere was a theatrical air about Osama bin Laden. He cultivated mystique. For example, he relished inviting selected international journalists–some known for their own theatricality–to meet him in dangerous or shadowy circumstances that facilitated dramatic storytelling. I had a minor part in bringing Bin Laden to the world stage in 1996 when I interviewed him in Khartoum for a TIME magazine story headlined “The Paladin of Jihad.” Bin Laden’s enemies added to the hype. George W. Bush, the gun-slinging president from Texas, responded to September 11 with a line straight out of Hollywood: “I want justice. And there's an old poster out West I recall, that said, 'Wanted: Dead or Alive.'"Read More
The Worst-Kept SecretNabil FahmyThe Worst-Kept Secret: Israel’s Bargain with the Bomb. By Avner Cohen. Columbia University Press, 2010. 416 pp.
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Dictators and the InternetWarigia BowmanThe Internet network is inherently not governed. Yet, each player has a valuable role. January 27 teaches us that a move away from centralization, particularly in the presence of autocratic governments, is crucial. Read More