|
|||||
|
Andrew Bacevich makes an extremely important point about some of the costs associated with perpetuating long term war(s), and how such a military posture erodes democratic institutions Long wars are antithetical to democracy. Protracted conflict introduces toxins that inexorably corrode the values of popular government. Not least among those values is a code of military conduct that honors [...] RFE-RL reports on a battle over efforts to bring Iran’s Azad University under principlist control: “On one side are hard-liners within the Iranian establishment, most prominently President Mahmud Ahmadinejad, who appears ready to punish Azad University for its alleged support for opposition candidates in the 2009 presidential election. Supporting Ahmadinejad is the Supreme Council [...] William Dalrymple has written a rather insightful article on our current predicament in Afghanistan, leavened with a historical recounting of Britain’s own 19th century experience with conflict in that part of the world. This is a pretty fair summation of the score: The reality of our present Afghan entanglement is that we took sides in [...] Shadi Hamid offers a partial defense of General McChrystal, prasing, in particular, McChrystal’s emphasis on population-centric counterinsurgency doctrine, and the restrained rules of engagement that go along therewith: …If we’re going to fight a war, we should probably fight it under someone who’s sensitive to the loss of innocent life. Not just because it’s [...] In a somewhat brazen fashion, General McChrystal and some of his top aides have taken to the pages of Rolling Stone to air out political differences with some top administration officials, and the story, is rightly, generating quite a bit of controversey. In the Rolling Stone piece, McChrystal and his team level some harsh (and pointed) criticisms at Vice President Biden, National Security Advisor [...] Joe Klein reports on what is becoming an increasingly popular form of pre-emptive scapegoating for what will be the inevitable failure to achieve the more grandiose objectives in Afghanistan (via Michael Cohen): There are increasing grumblings about the timetable set by Obama, which would begin troop withdrawals in July 2011. “It’s like fighting with both arms tied [...] Marc Lynch has an extremely insightful post about the impact of US foreign policy on the Middle East and its various ruling regimes: “So the Arab core grows hollow,” laments former Bush administration Middle East adviser Elliott Abrams in the Weekly Standard today. Most of the essay is an unexceptional restatement of neo-conservative tropes: [...] |
Blake Hounshell (aka praktike), our co-founder and main man, is managing editor of Foreign Policy magazine. He's now reporting on the Egyptian Revolution from Cairo. 
|
||||
|
American Footprints 30 queries. 0.888 seconds. |
|||||