Maj. Danny Sjursen, USA (ret.)

Part 1 “War is the health of the state.” So said the eerily prescient and uncompromising antiwar radical Randolph Bourne in the very midst of what Europeans called the Great War, a nihilistic conflict that eventually consumed the lives of at least 9 million soldiers, including some 50,000 Americans. He meant, ultimately, that wars – … Continue reading “The Long Shadow of World War I and America’s War on Dissent”

History is over. The world is flat. These were the sort of self-congratulatory and wildly grandiose platitudes that passed for wisdom in the first decade after the United States declared "victory" in the Cold War. Neither slim statement is true – at least not in the sense they meant them – naturally: literally (of course), … Continue reading “Marines, Not McDonald’s: Tom Friedman’s Fortune-Telling Folly”

This article originally appeared at TruthDig. My Spotify workout playlist is a time warp. Growing up in a blue-collar neighborhood of New York City in the 1990s and early 2000s, listening to popular East Coast hip-hop was practically required. So on a recent morning in which I had planned to write a column about Israel/Palestine, … Continue reading “America and Israel Against the World”

Israel is America’s veritable little brother. For decades, now, Tel Aviv has set the gold standard for nutty foreign policy decisions. Almost nothing they’ve done since the Six day War of 1967 has made a bit of sense. Founded, as they were, in the midst of a multinational Arab invasion, Israel has remained attached – … Continue reading “Counterproductive Insanity: Israeli Foreign Policy Then and Now”

Academic historians reject anything smacking of inevitably. Instead they emphasize the contingency of events as manifested through the inherent agency of human beings and the countless decisions they make. On the merits, such scholars are basically correct. That said, there was something – if not inevitable – highly probable, almost (forgive me) deterministic about the … Continue reading “Beyond Ukraine: America’s Coming (Losing) Battle for Eurasia”

Apathy and misplaced priorities: the twin diseases of this generation. I spent this past Saturday afternoon speaking through a bullhorn in opposition to war – or at least opposition to escalating the existing state of war – with Iran, during a local rally as part of the International Day of Action on the subject. Street … Continue reading “The Impeachment Show: Asking All the Wrong Questions on Ukraine”

Originally posted at TomDispatch. What’s the value of an American life in the age of Donald Trump? If you were judging by the death of Nawres Hamid, an Iraqi-American contractor killed in late December after an American base in Iraq was mortared by a Shiite militia believed to have ties to Iran, the answer would … Continue reading “US Foreign Policy Goes Off the Rails”

I’ve had it out for Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Army General Mark Milley, of late. My dislike for the man might even constitute an intellectual blind spot. Count me guilty as charged. I’ve mistrusted this character – who brilliantly weaves both plainspoken soldier’s bluster with a veneer of intellectualism – ever since he addressed … Continue reading “Lying Generals and the Lies They Tell”

Don’t buy the hype 1.0: Look, the administration, Fox News, and a Twitter army of Trumpsters are about to unleash a wave of propaganda. The president was right to assassinate Soleimani all along, they’ll say. The Iranian missiles fired on Tuesday night missed all American targets – perhaps on purpose – resulting in zero U.S. … Continue reading “The Islamic Republic of Restraint”

We, as Americans, are now living in different realities. The almost completely partisan response to Donald Trump’s decision to assassinate one of Iran’s top leaders proves that once and for all. To listen to Mitch McConnell versus Nancy Pelosi – and just about all their underlings – argue about the execution, is to almost believe … Continue reading “Who Started It?: A (Reverse) Timeline of US/Iran Retaliations”