Dexter Filkins’s deeply reported piece in the New Yorker on the assassination of Pakistani journalist Syed Saleem Shahzad earlier this year is worth the read. Yes, it covers territory we’ve all trod across — the likely involvement of Pakistan’s military intelligence agency, the ISI; the confused allegiances of the Pakistani …
Afghanistan
For the U.S. to Leave Afghanistan, It Has to Be Ready to Stay
When former Saudi Ambassador Prince Turki bin Faisal Al Saud suggested last week at a terrorism conference hosted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington that the U.S. should have used the death of Osama bin Laden in May as an excuse to immediately pull troops out of Afghanistan, he was met with …
Ahmed Shah Massoud: A Decade After His Murder, Would Afghanistan Be Different Were He Alive?
Ten years ago today, the assassination of a militia leader holed up in the north-east corner of Afghanistan garnered little international attention, except perhaps for the Hollywood-worthy way in which he was killed: two suicide terrorists, posing as Belgian documentary journalists, detonated their explosives-packed video camera just …
How 9/11 Provoked the U.S. to Hasten its Own Decline
During his first year in office, President George W. Bush was confronted by the key strategic challenge facing the United States in the new century, in an incident that began with the diversion of a U.S. aircraft — by Chinese fighter planes, which forced a U.S. Navy spy plane to land on the island of Hainan after a collision that …
Afghanistan’s Shrinking Security Forces: A Gaping Hole in Obama’s War Strategy
The military intervention in Afghanistan that began a month after the 9/11 attacks is the longest war in U.S. history, costing 1,750 American lives (and counting) and upward of $300 billion (and counting). And it’s becoming harder to believe Washington’s promises that the end is in sight. President Obama will, this year, withdraw …
Is Libya a New Model of U.S. Intervention, or an Afghanistan Do-Over?
It’s easy to see how Libya offers a “new model” for American intervention abroad when comparing it with the ill-conceived invasion of Iraq in 2003, but the mission to overthrow the regime of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi has too much in common with the U.S. intervention in Afghanistan to mark it, at this stage, as the herald of a new era of …
Libya: Perils of the End Game
The good news from Libya is that the collapse of the Gaddafi regime is reportedly accelerating, with rebel forces making military advances towards Tripoli on three fronts and two key regime figures reported to have defected in as many days. But every silver lining has its cloud: The rebellion against Gaddafi has, in recent weeks, …
Could French Doubts On Afghanistan Influence Future Foreign Policy?
It may wind up proving to be nothing more than mere politics, but if the re-thinking now being expressed by French Socialists about the country’s engagement in Afghanistan is in earnest, it could have some serious consequences for the military operations Paris is already involved in—and any more than might be looming.
On …
Why Turkey Holds the Key to the Regional Power Game on Syria
As the Assad regime on Sunday escalated its brutal crackdown by sending gunboats to shell the coastal city of Latakia, yet the rebellion shows no sign of abating despite at least 1,700 deaths so far, Syria’s fate may come to rest less in the hands of its own people, than in the corridors of power in neighboring and more distant …
U.S. Global Influence Tanks with the Economy
You say you want a revolution? Not now, mate, can’t you see we’re busy?
“It’s the economy, stupid,” was the focal message around which Bill Clinton organized his against-the-odds 1992 campaign victory over President George H.W. Bush. The incumbent had presided over the soft landing of the collapsing Soviet empire and driven Saddam …
Five Lessons the World Will Take From U.S. Economic Policy Gridlock
Washington may have cut an unlovable deal to avert a default on its debts, but U.S. and global stock markets are tanking anyway. That’s because the measures agreed Tuesday can’t reverse the slide of the U.S. economy — its fundamentals, to use a phrase beloved by politicians, are less than sound. So, what the world sees in America’s …
Six Things to Watch from Hillary Clinton’s India Tour
President Obama grabbed hearts and headlines with his state visit to India last fall, and there was a lot of talk about bringing the two countries closer together. It’s “a defining partnership of the 21st century” between “natural allies” who have committed themselves to a “strategic dialogue.” What does it all mean? …
Why the CIA’s Vaccine Ruse Is a Setback for Global Health
Last week, the Guardian broke the news that in the run-up to the raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound, the CIA used a vaccination campaign as a ruse to get DNA evidence from the al-Qaeda leader’s kids. With help from a Pakistani doctor, Shakil Afridi, they set up clinics in two neighborhoods, delivering doses of the Hepatitis B …