News Abroad

Bush's Maginot Line in the Sky

by Lawrence S. Wittner

Forty years ago, when a U.S. participant in an international nuclear arms control conference proposed a treaty to ban anti-ballistic missile (ABM) systems, the head of the Soviet delegation said that there must have been a problem with the translation. He had heard

What Exactly Is Our Goal in Iraq?

by Daniel Pipes

What should be the U.S. goal in Iraq? The American government is clear on this point: it is"a free and peaceful Iraq," which it presents as critical to the stability of the Middle East, which, in turn,"is critical to the security of the American people."A free and peaceful Iraq is one in the American image — democratic, liberal, capitalist, under the rule of law. While completely sympathetic to this vision — who could not be? — I worry both that

What Democracy in Iraq Would Look Like

by Paul Sullivan

There is a lot of debate and talk about democratizing the Arab world. What does not seem clear is how this is to be done, when, where first, and who should do this. Let’s try to answer the first one first. Who should make democracy happen in the Arab world? The Arabs should. If anyone tries to impose it from the outside such changes will be unwelcome, especially if they are done violently – as we are now seeing. My sense is, however, that Arab people would be willing to see

We Are Losing the War Over Pictures

by Juan Cole

The war of guns is only part of any great military enterprise. It is always supplemented by a war of words and, in the modern world, a war of images. The Bush administration, despite the savvy of its spinmeisters and Hollywood-trained publicists, has lost the war of images abroad. Although it has had more success in managing war images at home, cracks have increasingly opened up on the domestic front as well. The graphic photos of abused Iraqi prisoners released on CBS's "60 Minut

De-Bathification Went too Far

by Walid Phares and Robert G. Rabil

The U.S. administrator of Iraq Paul J. Bremer’s de-Ba’thification order of May 16, 2003, stipulated that Ba’th party members holding the senior ranks of Adu Qutr (regional command member), Adu Fir’ (branch member), and Adu Shu’ba (section member) are banned from public sector employment. The order added that employees holding the top three level management positions in all state institutions will be removed from their employment if they are found to be Ba’t

We Are Repeating the Mistake We Made in the Philippines 100 Years Ago

by William Loren Katz

Weapons of mass destruction, a slam-dunk war followed by a no-end-in-sight occupation? We’ve been here before when a century ago the U.S. first sent an army overseas to accomplish regime change and liberate a resource-rich land from tyranny. It began in February, 1898 when an explosion sunk the U.S. battleship Maine in Havana harbor. Since Cubans lived under a cruel Spanish colonialism, a pro-war U.S. press felt free to claim that Spain unleashed a weapon of mass destructi

Putting SARS in Historical Perspective

by Howard Markel, M.D., Ph.D.

The waves of hysteria inspired by last year's SARS epidemic, not to mention those created by the more quickly contained annual spread of influenza this past winter recalls President Harry Truman's pithy observation that “there is nothing new in the world except the history you don't know.”Although recent phenomena, SARS, avian influenza, garden-variety influenza, and even briefer brushes with more exotic emerging infectious such as West Nile Fever and monkey pox have more in common wit

Should We Be Alarmed by the Wide Use of Mercenaries?

by Nikolas K. Gvosdev

The recent carnage in Iraq has made public a dirty little secret: some of the personnel on duty there are not volunteer patriots dedicated to bringing liberty to Iraqis but paid professionals -- private military contractors, or, more plainly, mercenaries. Peter Singer of the Brookings Institution estimates that private contractors now make up the second largest military contingent in Iraq, after the (official) U.S. military force. Mercenaries are being hired by governments for a number

Column: Playing God—Or, Playing with Gods (Letter from Japan, Part 7)

by William Thompson

This spring Mr. Thompson is a visiting professor at Osaka University of Commerce. This is the seventh of his"Letters from Japan.""If this thing fizzles, each of you can look forward to a lifetime of testifying before congressional investigating committ

Custer? The Alamo? Iraq 2004

by Tom Engelhardt

Quotes of the Week: "One senior American officer said that in any urban fight, American troops could turn Falluja into 'a killing field in a couple of days…' One senior American officer said, 'How Falluja is resolved has huge reverberations, not just in Iraq but throughout the entire area.' Or, as another senior officer put it, 'We have the potential to turn this into the Alamo if we get it wrong.'" (Eric Schmitt,

Testimony at Senate Foreign Relations Committee: U.S. Mistakes in Iraq

by Juan Cole

Mr. Cole's testimony was given on April 20, 2004.This brief addresses three areas. First, what mistakes have been made in the Coalition administration of Iraq, and why? Second, what is the current situation? Third, what steps can be taken to ensure the emergence of a stable and democratic Iraq?Mistakes The biggest U.S. failure in Iraq to date lay in American inability to understand the workings of Iraqi society. Many U.S. administr

Palestinians Have Another Chance, Thanks to President Bush

by Judith Apter Klinghoffer

It was with great admiration that I watched George W. Bush cutting yet another Gordian knot - this time he told the Palestinians that they have to forget"the right of return" of the 1948-1949 refugees to Israeli territories. They will have to settle their refugees in their portion of Palestine.  Moreover, that portion will not necessarily follow the 1949 armistice lines.  Life goes on and it's time for the Palestinians and their supporters to realize that fact and stop pining over

Column: Encounters with History (Letter from Japan, Part 6)

by William Thompson

This spring Mr. Thompson is a visiting professor at Osaka University of Commerce. This is the sixth of his"Letters from Japan."KokuraA while ago I was cleaning out an attic. It was an old house. More than seventy years of stuff had a

Column: A Conversation with a Survivor of Hiroshima (Letters from Japan, Part 5)

by William Thompson

This spring Mr. Thompson is a visiting professor at Osaka University of Commerce. This is the fifth of his"Letters from Japan."A conversation in a cab I met Keiko in the museum café where we shared a coffee and a light lunch. My brother was vi

Iraq Needs a Strongman

by Daniel Pipes

The current insurrection in Iraq was discernable a year ago, as I already noted in April 2003:"Thousands of Iraqi Shiites chanted"‘No to America, No to Saddam, Yes to Islam" a few days ago, during pilgrimage rites at the holy city of Karbala. Increasing numbers of Iraqis appear to agree with these sentiments. They have ominous implications for the coalition forces." The recent wave of violence makes those implications fully apparent. Two factors in particular made me expect Iraq

Did You Know the U.S. Was Once Considered a Rogue Nation?

by Robert E. May

Because we forget that the United States was once considered a rogue nation exporting terrorism, the nation's senior officials risk making serious policy mistakes today. The United States a rogue nation? Though it may be hard to believe, before the Civil War, people in Latin America, Western Europe, and even the faraway Hawaiian kingdom were convinced that the United States had become a base for terrorists.No one then actually used the term "terrorism" for unautho

Why The Doctrine of Nuclear Deterrence Is Morally Offensive

by Chris Pettit

A recent New York Times article entitled "Addressing the Inevitable" addressed the United States government's revival of "fallout analysis," that is, the forensic science of determining the materials used in a nuclear weapon and where those materials were manufactured, all after detonation of the weapon has already occurred. While the thought of a nuclear weapon being detonated anywhere on Earth is horrifying, and determining its origin and deton

Column: Revisiting Hiroshima (Letters from Japan, Part 4)

by William Thompson

This spring Mr. Thompson is a visiting professor at Osaka University of Commerce. This is the fourth of his"Letters from Japan." I tell people here that all Americans should visit Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Not to feel overwhelming guilt or overwhelming remorse, but simply to kick the jag of "We're number one." And also to get off this "Bosnia Game" of pretending that war can be easy, and that we can have wars without people being hurt…and, that i

Column: Letters from Japan (Part 1)

by William Thompson

 This Spring I have been granted a sabbatical leave from the University of Nevada,Las Vegas. I have chosen to study a broad topic--gambling in Asia and gambling by Asian people. My central question is: do Asians gamble more, and if so, why? The question has led me to a consideration of Eastern religions. Also as I am starting my sabbatical travels in Japan, I am seeking to observe matters Japanese and of historical relevance re Japan and the U.S. and perhaps even relevant

Column: Letters from Japan (Part 2)

by William Thompson

Mr. Thompson is traveling in Japan this spring. This is the second of his two letters. Click here to read his first letter.Religion has been a part of Japanese life from the earliest folk eras thousands of years ago. Folk practices then blended with later religions. Buddhism came to Japan in the sixth century and established a dominant hold on the people. However, Shinto religion soon emerged and incorporated a blend of Buddhist ideas as