While Julian Assange is the person with the rock star persona, Bradley Manning is the true center of this documentary.
It was Manning who leaked information to WikiLeaks and who now faces trial for doing so.
Army Pfc. Manning is portrayed in the film as a confused and somewhat naïve …
Washington is in a rush and everyone knows it
The U.S. commentariat spent much of last month ruminating over the lessons of the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq. Left unexamined were the important lessons relating to the U.S. endgame in that country and how they should be applied to the accelerating …
Anniversaries are dangerous days. There is often a flash of attention, lots of words and supposedly deep thought and meaningful promises. Then the sun goes down, and life goes on as before. The world often notes an anniversary without real thought or determination on how to take the steps needed …
The tenth anniversary of the Iraq War is upon us, and we have been inundated with reminiscences and reflections on the war’s conduct and especially on its origins. One that struck me in particular came from Charles Duelfer, who argues that the Bush …
“Old men forget: yet all shall be forgot,” exclaims Shakespeare’s Henry V in his fervid St. Crispian’s day speech on the eve of the battle of Agincourt in 1415. In the observance of this month’s 10th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq there appears to be no danger …
With the French military intervention in Mali shifting to a more sustained action, the reality of the long, hard slog in the Mali region has triggered inevitable questions by diplomats, policy planners and many others as to what defines success – and what comes next?
Most mouthed answer: “Somalia.”
That’s correct. The …
The eleventh Iranian presidential election is scheduled to be held this June. Local council elections will also take place at the same time as presidential elections.
To take an analytic look at this year’s Iranian elections from a number of relevant angles, the Foreign Policy Association (FPA) will …
Co-Authored by Azadeh Pourzand and Reza Akhlaghi
The Region at A Glance
2012 was the year that the Middle East entered a period of turbo instability. This period accentuated itself in different parts of the region in different forms. Syria’s civil war reached a point of no-return-to-normalcy, ensuring only one outcome for …
Even as President Obama trumpets his plans to withdraw U.S. combat troops from Afghanistan in two years’ time, he also insists (though in a sotto voce way) that he wants to maintain a limited but long-term military presence focused on counter-terrorism missions and training Afghan security …
With President Obama’s second term around the corner, it is a perfect moment to look back at the administration’s so-called “light footprint” strategy – a military strategy characterized by the use of targeted tactics like drone strikes and the avoidance of large-scale, on-the-ground intervention. As journalist David Sanger
As most media outlets are reporting, over the last month several errant mortars have been fired into Israel’s Golan Heights from Syria. The IDF has determined many of them can be traced back to forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Showing restraint the Jewish state chose not to respond …
The possible Balkanization of Syria is an increasingly likely prospect – at least for the short-term – and could provide a historic counterpoint in the Middle East to what the West did to carve up the region almost a century ago.
With the Ottoman Empire defeated after World War I, the triumphant Allies …
Back in the swing of things.
“Iraq could overtake Russia as the world’s second-largest oil supplier behind Saudi Arabia by the 2030s, nearly tripling its current output, according to a report from the International Energy Agency.” (h/t The LA Times)
“Iraq has signed contracts …
Iraq’s oil minister Abdul Kareem Luaiby anticipates his country’s exports for September to exceed 2.6 million barrels a day, a figure not reached in the last 20 or so years. Part of this increase stems from a deal cut between the central government and the Kurdish autonomous region. The Kurds …
Bijan Kian is a Senior Fellow for Global Public Policy at the Naval Postgraduate School. He has served President George W. Bush and President Barack Obama from 2006 to 2011 as a member of the Board of Directors of the Export-Import Bank of the United …
