While reducing U.S. forces in the Mideast, President Obama has pivoted toward a more robust presence in the Pacific, including pushing allies like Japan to bolster their militaries, notes Ann Wright.
Pressing Japan on No-War Pledge
Tag: China
The Future in a Dazzling Shanghai
The biggest winner from the U.S. government shutdown and near credit default may be China as it pushes for a “de-Americanized” world economy, a future on display in a dazzling Shanghai, writes Beverly Deepe Keever from Shanghai.
What Nixon/Kissinger Got Right
Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger operated in an amoral world where they traded lives and principles for power. But their cold “realism” enabled them to function more effectively in foreign policy than many of their successors who let passions and…
Forgetting the Threat from Nukes
In recent weeks, international attention has focused on the apparent use of chemical weapons in Syria. But nuclear weapons represent an even greater threat to human life, and the countries possessing these fearsome weapons continue to press ahead in modernizing them,…
US, China Contend with Resentment
Americans like to be liked and are often perplexed why so many people around the world “hate us.” Some of that comes from specific policies like support for Israel and drone strikes, but there’s also the resentment toward big-power arrogance,…
US Energy Renaissance Shifts Power
Exclusive: When President Obama addressed the global warming crisis last month, he linked progress on “green” energy with America’s greater natural gas production and strides toward energy independence, two themes that are quietly transforming global power relationships, writes Andrés Cala.
Why Snowden’s Fate Matters
Exclusive: There’s an old saying that a reporter is only as good as his sources, meaning that there’s a need for people inside government who see wrongdoing to speak up. It is also a test of a democratic Republic whether truth-tellers like…
China Tip-Toes into Mideast Peace
The pro-Israel lobby has been so effective dominating U.S. policy toward the Middle East that the success, paradoxically, has made Washington increasingly irrelevant to the peace process. That has created a vacuum that China and other nations may try to…
The Danger from Conventional Wisdom
Official Washington’s “conventional wisdom” is a pernicious fact of life in the U.S. capital as various presumed realities reverberate through the echo chamber of policymakers and journalists. Conventional wisdom is especially dangerous when what-everybody-knows-is-true isn’t, as ex-CIA analyst Paul R.…
Hypocrisy Over Iran’s Nuclear Program
In recent decades, the U.S. government and news media have treated international law as a matter of convenience and hypocrisy, applying rules self-righteously when they’re useful and ignoring them when a hindrance. The dispute over Iran’s nuclear program is a case in…