A half century ago, the U.S. government began a campaign of spraying Agent Orange herbicides on the forests of Southeast Asia, thinking that by defoliating vast areas, the military could more effectively bomb the “enemy” but instead created an ecological…
Exclusive: Ukraine’s Finance Minister Natalie Jaresko and other key officials were given overnight Ukrainian citizenship — with the law requiring them to renounce their old allegiances — but the American-born Jaresko has balked at that mandate, raising questions about her…
Israel’s long-running persecution of the Palestinians continues to stir up hatreds and violence across the Middle East, but Prime Minister Netanyahu remains intent on shifting the collective blame to the people under Israeli occupation, a dilemma that Michael Winship examines.
Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states went through the motions of joining the U.S.-led fight against the Islamic State and other Sunni terrorists, who received substantial help from the same Gulf states, but those U.S. “allies” have now slipped out of the conflict almost entirely, says…
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu continues to play the tune to which U.S. politicians, including presidents and presidential candidates, dance. Now, his price for a future swirl around the dance floor is being raised to $4.5 billion a year, as retired Army Col.…
Exclusive: The near-three-decade-old Pan Am 103 case — a plane bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland — shows how a dubious “group think” of Official Washington not only withstands scrutiny but can become the foundation for further allegations and become “history,” as…
With hardliners controlling the Israeli government and the Mideast ablaze, prospects for an Israeli-Palestinian peace seem as dim as they have in decades, but the worsening conflict and its regional impact also create new pressures for some kind of resolution,…
From the Archive: On Veterans Day, Americans make a point of thanking men and women who have served in the U.S. Armed Forces. But this appreciation has the effect of shielding today’s perpetual warfare from the critical examination it deserves,…
Sen. Rubio and most other Republican presidential contenders are competing with ambitious plans to launch a new U.S. military buildup, arguing that the modest cuts under President Obama have gutted America’s global strength, a dubious proposition that budget watchdog Chuck Spinney explores.
Many progressives struggle with the “lesser-evil” dilemma. They may sympathize with Green Party positions but fear that voting for Green candidates will give right-wing Republicans control of the U.S. government, as in getting George W. Bush close enough to steal…
Turkish President Erdogan’s electoral victory opens new risks and some hopes for the region’s future, depending on whether an empowered Erdogan ratchets up his autocratic approach or chooses to ease up on his military adventurism and repression of the Kurds, as…
Though President Obama touts America as a nation of laws and evenhanded justice, there is a blatant double-standard regarding how people are punished for national security breaches whistleblowers are harshly punished but the well-connected get a pass, writes John Hanrahan.
Exclusive: Ukraine’s Finance Minister Natalie Jaresko collected at least $1.77 million in bonuses from a U.S.-taxpayer-funded investment project that she ran even as it was losing money, a sign that her image as a paragon of public-interest “reform” may not…
In shutting down whistleblowing and investigative journalism on national security issues, the U.S. government can use its technology to determine who is speaking to whom and then use that metadata as evidence of leaks, a chilling new reality that endangers democracy,…
A fairly new and thoroughly obnoxious Christmas tradition is for right-wing American Christian fundamentalists to detect some imagined slight and pronounce it part of the “War on Christmas,” with this year’s battle lines drawn around the Starbucks’ winter-themed cups, as…
From the Archive: As Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu meets with President Obama, the mainstream media is asking who’s to blame for their chilly relationship. But the problem is not just personal. It goes to Israel’s longstanding efforts to out-fox U.S. presidents,…
Exclusive: A dozen years too late, President George H.W. Bush has given voice to his doubts about the wisdom of rushing into the Iraq War, putting much of the blame on President George W. Bush’s “iron-ass” advisers, Dick Cheney and…
Despite Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s in-your-face attempts to sabotage President Obama’s foreign policy, Official Washington’s liberal establishment is on bended knee in an obsequious show of obeisance, apparently in line with Hillary Clinton’s political wishes, writes ex-CIA analyst Paul R. Pillar.
The Obama administration is so wedded to its false narrative on Syria insisting that the only answer is for Russia to force President Assad to cede power to a largely fictional U.S.-backed “moderate” opposition that new peace talks in Vienna…
Exclusive: President Obama’s plan to dispatch up to 50 Special Forces troops into northern Syria may be a bid to appease Official Washington’s war hawks but it presents a serious risk of “mission creep” if those soldiers and their trainees…