Intervention
Interventionism’s Moral Narrative Has Crumbled
When Western governments, led by the Biden administration, switched focus from the staling Ukraine-Russia conflict to a reinvigorated Israel-Palestine one, they exposed one of the most repeatedly deployed tools for...
Washington’s Dubious Syria Intervention Continues
With the world’s attention focused on the Russia-Ukraine War and growing tensions between China and the United States over Taiwan, other worrisome U.S. ventures tend to fly under the radar....
Forever Wars Weaken Great Power Crisis Response
The dismal end of two decades of failed nation-building in Afghanistan in the summer of 2021 came with howls of protest in the press and a resurrection of Bush Era-style...
It’s Time to Get Serious About Tackling Electoral Violence
As Kenyans prepare to cast their ballots in next Tuesday’s election, the risk of violence hangs over the outcome. For decades, Kenya’s elections have been flashpoints for inflammatory political rhetoric,...
Can the United States Kick Its Afghanistan Syndrome?
America’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan last fall has often been compared to the collapse of Saigon in 1975, and not without good reason. Images of desperate Afghans clinging to transport...
Could Big Tech Play Peacemaker in Ukraine?
More than 10 million refugees have been forced to relocate from Ukraine according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, with 3.6 million seeking shelter outside of the country...
3 Wars the U.S. Should Have Fought Differently
In a previous article, I provided a summary of wars the U.S. should have avoided fighting to avoid tragic and unforeseen consequences that served to create new enemies, making the...
8 Wars the United States Should Never Have Fought
A study of the outcome of major wars fought over the past 125 years strongly suggests that U.S. military involvement in these conflicts has resulted in tragic and unforeseen consequences....
A Grand Strategy of Restraint Needs a ‘Counter Elite’
MOST REALIST international relations theories (and even most liberal ones) follow some fundamental assumptions—that the world is anarchic without a global policeman and global hegemony is unsustainable. Nation-states, the primary...
Has America’s Influence in the Middle East Really Declined?
It has become commonplace to read or hear from commentators that America’s position in the Middle East has drastically declined. Some even see U.S. influence there as being on the...
Reality as Disciplinarian
JOE BIDEN launched his presidency with a bold message: America is back. The rank amateurs who had made such a mess of foreign policy under President Donald Trump would be...
Its Time to Admit It: America Lost the Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq
Editor’s note: In early August, The National Interest organized a symposium on American foreign policy in the Middle East under the Biden administration. A variety of scholars were asked the following question: “Given...