The Olympics have finally concluded. These 2012 London Olympics will be remembered in many ways: NBC’s recorded coverage, Michael Phelps, Gabby’s 10,000 watt smile, 100 foot tall Voldemort, Usain Bolt, and British rock band after British rock band performing with strange props. It was an inspiring couple of weeks, and I enjoyed watching these amazing […]
Bradley Strawser, an assistant professor of philosophy at the Naval Postgraduate School, recently (and somewhat predictably) took some flak after the Guardian published a piece in which he appeared to make a fairly unequivocal moral case in support of U.S. drone policy. “It’s all upside. There’s no downside. Both ethically and normatively, there’s a tremendous […]
The Arab Spring awoke people to the power of social media in a political context. Of course, you would have to be living under a rock to think it was the first time Twitter was ever used to coordinate mass protests — it was hugely prominent in Iran during the 2009 protests, Moldova, and the Greek riots in […]
The U.S. is the only country to have used nuclear weapons in war. As we approach the anniversary of the nuclear attack on Hiroshima, it’s an appropriate time to take a look at the state of U.S. nuclear policy. American nuclear policy has changed dramatically under the Obama Administration. True or false? It’s true […]
The reinvention of the U.S. industrial sector promises far-reaching global consequences Pushing back against the deluge of punditry about America’s strategic eclipse, my last post argued that the U.S. global position is being bolstered greatly by a revolution in domestic energy production that began to take shape in the past few years. Although it has not […]
Since its inception, the U.N. Monitoring Group on Somalia (and Eritrea) has been rolling over controversies, mainly in its reporting, sourcing, and unsubstantiated claims. I just got through reading its latest report made of truths, half-truths, and a whole lot of innuendoes that implicate at least four present/past officials and presidential candidates with certain […]
The energy boom upends arguments about the inevitability of U.S. strategic decline A previous post peered into the crystal ball to argue that America’s strategic prospects are dramatically brightening due to an unexpectedly improving energy outlook and the looming revitalization of its manufacturing base. This thesis cuts against the reigning anxiety about the nation’s economic course […]
The first comprehensive history of U.S. foreign policy on Facebook. The Foreign Policy Association is proud to announce the launch of the Foreign Policy Timeline on Facebook. Utilizing one of the latest tools offered by the popular social media site, the Foreign Policy Timeline begins at the founding of the FPA in 1918 and offers viewers […]
This last week I watched part of Niall Ferguson’s “Civilization: The West and the Rest” series, one of two video segments exploring aspects of Western culture that have set it apart from others. The show is visually rich, with splices of early 20th century footage and modern cityscapes, with Ferguson himself often on camera and […]
After more than a year of planning, much diplomatic hype, and thousands of attendees, last month’s UN Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro produced what one activist called a “failure of epic proportions.” The few agreements—including yet another “universal intergovernmental high level political forum” to talk some more—seemed to fall well short of the challenge […]
1776: The Musical (1969; movie 1972) “Waiting for the chirp, chirp, chirp. Of an eaglet being born. Waiting for the chirp, chirp, chirp. On this humid Monday Morning in this Congressional incubator.” The Guardian, probably rightfully, declared that 1776 was “[f]ar too long and mostly terrible, but hilarious.” Now, the real question–why would anyone ever decide to make the Second Continental […]
Why is it that the media in the West seem to fixate on some stories while completely ignoring others? The strategic analysis firm Stratfor recently sent their subscribers a report by Robert Kaplan that contained the following quote that provides an insightful answer: The media love people stories; they love to humanize everything about a […]
Media reports on the disappearance of Jordanian Al Arabiya TV journalist Baker Atyani and his two local crew members in the Philippines have published conflicting information in the last two days. According to the most recent reports, the crew was possibly kidnapped while working in the southern Philippines. The Philippine Star says of the case: […]
The following piece was originally published in on the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. by R. Scott Kemp R. Scott Kemp is an associate research scholar with the Program on Science and Global Security at the Woodrow Wilson School for Public and International Affairs at Princeton University. Before this, he was science advisor in the Office […]
I just watched a fascinating video from Reuters TV about a tiny town in Afghanistan named “Little America.” Located in the Helmand Province in Southern Afghanistan, “Little America” was the largest development project in Afghanistan’s history. First populated by Americans during the Cold War, it was developed to counteract Soviet influence in the region. The US spent hundreds […]