Peter Roady is Assistant Professor of History at the University of Utah. This interview is based on his new book, The Contest over National Security: FDR, Conservatives, and the Struggle to Claim the Most Powerful Phrase in American Politics (Harvard […]
U.S. foreign policy
Tangled up in alliances? U.S. involvement in NATO
Brian Bengs’ analysis of NATO and collective security is worth thinking about, whether you agree or disagree.
U.S. intelligence doubts that Iran was directly involved in the Hamas attack on Israel, but a full conclusion on the matter is pending
CNN is reporting: The United States has collected specific intelligence that casts doubt on the idea that Iran was directly involved in the planning, resourcing or approving of Saturday’s bloody attack on Israel by Hamas, according to several sources familiar with the intelligence. Still, […]
The New York Times: “America’s duty as Israel’s friend is to stand firm in its support”
A taste of yesterday’s New York Times editorial page: President Biden is right to express America’s full support for Israel at this painful moment. The United States, as its closest ally, has a critical role to play. Moderate Israeli opposition leaders said […]
The intellectual roots of Biden’s response to Putin
Here is the team at Politico‘s “West Wing Playbook”: …Biden’s 2017 book, “Promise Me, Dad,” largely focused on his deceased son BEAU. But it still mentioned the Russian president more than 65 times. “While I had been encouraged by Putin’s willingness […]
The Author’s Corner with Sandra Moats
Sandra Moats is Professor of History at University of Wisconsin-Parkside. This interview is based on her new book, Navigating Neutrality: Early American Governance in the Turbulent Atlantic (University of Virginia Press, 2021). JF: What led you to write Navigating Neutrality? […]
Kazin: Biden must tell the truth about Afghanistan to save his presidency
Georgetown University historian and Current contributor Michael Kazin compares Biden to LBJ. Here is a taste of his piece at The New York Times: For days now, the news media has likened the chaotic end of our misadventure in Afghanistan, and the […]
“To charge President Biden with ‘losing’ Afghanistan makes no more sense than tagging President Gerald Ford with ‘losing’ Vietnam”
Historian Andrew Bacevich, in an op-ed at the New York Daily News, writes, “The war in Vietnam was effectively lost well before Ford even took office. The same judgment applies to Biden and Afghanistan.” Here is a more extended taste […]
Trump on Afghanistan: Then and now
Here is former president Trump on April 18, 2021: I wish Joe Biden wouldn’t use September 11th as the date to withdraw our troops from Afghanistan, for two reasons. First, we can and should get out earlier. Nineteen years is […]
“Processing ten years of denial in ten hours is rough”
I am still processing everything that happened in Afghanistan over the course of the last several days. At the moment, I am asking the same question everyone else is asking: Why didn’t Biden do a better job evacuating Americans and […]