Chronicle of a War, 20 Years On
The case for removing the worst of the Arab prison states looks more justifiable than ever, even as the blunders involved in its execution look even more unpardonable.
Brian Stewart
Brian Stewart is a New York-based political writer primarily focused on US foreign and defense policy.
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Will It Be Different This Time?
It is starting to look like a question of when, not if, the Islamic Republic of Iran will fall.
Putting the Cart before the Camel?
A plea for Arab democracy.
Death From Above
Ayman al-Zawahiri’s reign of pious terror is now over.
America Must Not Abandon Europe
The United States retains the capacity to defend the liberal order on both sides of Eurasia.
Pacifism and Papal Fallibility
The Pope is a perverse sort of pacifist, not a man of peace.
Revolution Betrayed
A review of The Right: The Hundred-Year War for American Conservatism by Matthew Continetti, Basic Books, 496 pages (April 2022) “So inevitable and yet so completely unforeseen” was Alexis de Tocqueville’s verdict on the French Revolution. Much the same can be said of Donald Trump’s hostile takeover
Macron Will Have to Do
A decent and competent Left might point out that France stands to gain exactly nothing from an “alliance” with Putin’s dictatorship proposed by the likes of Le Pen.
Can the Revolution in German Foreign Policy Last?
During the fierce debate over the Iraq war, the German political scientist Karl Kaiser said, “Europeans have done something that no one has ever done before: create a zone of peace where war is ruled out, absolutely out.” And, he added, “Europeans are convinced that this model is valid for
A Failure of Deterrence
According to foreign policy “realists,” the tale we are being told about Vladimir Putin’s unprovoked war in Ukraine is a fiction. Realists like to be known for their clear-eyed appreciation of the realities of global power, and in their telling, responsibility for the war does not lie chiefly
Ukraine in the Balance
As I write this, Vladimir Putin has moved more than 100,000 troops to Russia’s Ukrainian border, and has strongly implied that he will invade absent an ironclad guarantee that Ukraine will never be permitted to join NATO. Although the Biden administration has rejected that demand, a chorus of
This Is About More Than Ukraine
In the early days of World War Two, George Orwell published a marvelous essay entitled “England Your England.” With the Luftwaffe in the skies above London laying waste to the city, Orwell observed a peculiarly contemptible trait of the English intelligentsia. In a word, this portion of the national elite