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commentary
If the government is demanding transparency of physicians and hospitals, the very least the physicians and hospitals should do is demand transparency of the government, writes Robert Brook.
Apr 1, 2009
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has described the upcoming high-level conference on Afghanistan at The Hague as a "big-tent meeting, with all the parties who have a stake and an interest in Afghanistan." With the situation in that country growing more precarious by the day, those attending this meeting must also think big, write Karl F. Inderfurth and James Dobbins.
Mar 26, 2009
At the upcoming NATO summit in Strasbourg-Kehl, French President Sarkozy is expected to formally announce France's return to NATO's integrated military command, from which President de Gaulle withdrew France in 1966. The full reintegration of France into NATO, if confirmed, will remove an important irritant in U.S.-French relations and open up new possibilities for strengthening U.S.-European cooperation more broadly, writes Stephen Larrabee.
Mar 24, 2009
Iran's presidential race just got more interesting, with former Prime Minister Mousavi throwing his hat in the ring and former President Khatami withdrawing his. This development poses the most significant challenge yet to current President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad - and a potential opportunity to alter the relationship between Iran and the West, writes Alireza Nader.
At a major conference in Munich last month, Vice President Joseph Biden underscored the U.S. determination to rebuild strong and productive relations with its European allies. No issue matters more than Afghanistan, writes Robert Hunter.
Mar 10, 2009
The Obama administration's decision to withdraw the bulk of United Sates troops from Iraq over the next 19 months has sparked fears that Iraq will once again plunge into the wide-scale and debilitating violence that it endured from 2004 to 2007. Those fears are, for the most part, overblown, writes Lowell Schwartz.
Mar 5, 2009
The Obama Administration's decision to commit another 17,000 troops to Afghanistan is unlikely to have an important effect unless it is part of a broader shift in U.S. and coalition strategy, write F. Stephen Larrabee and Julian Lindley-French.
Mar 4, 2009
On his first day in office, President Barack Obama issued a dramatic series of executive orders intended to symbolize a change of direction in America's "war" on terrorism. Despite the headlines these orders generated, a more significant policy shift may have been the one signaled the week before his inauguration, writes Benjamin Runkle.
Mar 3, 2009
If the dominant imperative is to stop Iran from getting the bomb, every month counts. Perhaps the simplest -- and certainly the quickest -- way to launch a dialogue with Iran, and the one least likely to play unhelpfully into the upcoming Iranian election, would be to simply stop not talking to Tehran, writes James Dobbins.
The story of how President Obama engineered a grass-roots campaign, mobilizing formerly disengaged U.S. citizens with new media and new technologies, has reached almost mythological proportions. Less well known is the story of similar grass-roots efforts emerging in local communities around the world, write Cherl Benard and Edward O'Connell.
Feb 27, 2009
Rather than perpetuating a love-hate-kill relationship with their leaders, Afghans need to develop respect for the laws and institutions of their new democracy, writes Cheryl Benard.
Feb 23, 2009
The election of Barack Obama provides an important opportunity to revitalize the trans-Atlantic security partnership. This partnership has served both sides well in the past. But after eight years of deep ideological differences during the Bush administration, it is badly frayed and in need of new leadership and new vision, write F. Stephen Larrabee and Julian Lindley-French.
Feb 22, 2009
The concrete contours of President Obama's foreign policy team have finally begun to emerge. What is intriguing is how many assignments are being given to those who have worked on the Korean peninsula, writes Chaibong Hahm.
Feb 16, 2009
Afghanistan has a reputation as a graveyard of empires, based as much on lore as on reality.... Yes, the situation is serious, but it's far from doomed. We can still turn things around if we strive for a better understanding of the Afghan insurgency and work to exploit its many weaknesses, writes Seth G. Jones.
Feb 15, 2009
This week's Israeli election results spotlight two notable trends. First, the Hamas attacks that prompted Israel's war in Gaza, and the war's aftermath, have moved the Israeli political center further toward the right. Second, where you stand depends in large part on where you live, writes Claude Berrebi.
Feb 13, 2009
