Doug Bandow

Tokyo’s boosters call Japan America’s most important ally. Former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe forged a close relationship with President Donald Trump, playing to the latter’s vanities. In response, Trump seemed to go easier on Tokyo, a longtime Pentagon cheap rider, than South Korea or Europe. Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga is due in Washington on Friday, … Continue reading “President Joe Biden Set for Summit with Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga”

More than six years ago Saudi Arabia attacked Yemen. The goal was to reinstall a friendly president to do Riyadh’s bidding. The royal regime assumed the campaign would be over in six weeks. Yet again the gods punished hubris and made the vainglorious pay a terrible price. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was merely the … Continue reading “Push Saudi Arabia To End the Assault on Yemen”

Today, April 7, is the official anniversary of the start of the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. Probably a half million or so people – estimates range wildly – were murdered in just 100 days. Most of the victims were Tutsis, though a number of moderate Hutus also were killed. Hundreds of thousands of women were … Continue reading “The Problem of Humanitarian Intervention: A Tough Challenge With No Good Answer”

The Napoleonic Wars consumed the lives of between 2.5 million and 3.5 million soldiers, most unwilling draftees. Although defeated, discredited, and exiled after years of brutal conflict, the self-anointed emperor responsible for those deaths today is honored – lionized, actually – in Paris. His tomb is located in the Hotel Les Invalides surrounded by commemorations … Continue reading “Is the Volunteer Military Too Expensive? Or Is Global Intervention Too Expensive?”

The United States tore itself apart with extraordinary violence 160 years ago. Around 750,000 Americans died in the Civil War, which would be about eight million dead today. It is an experience no American should want to go through again. Yet U.S. policymakers seem drawn to foreign conflicts like moths to light. Ronald Reagan, George … Continue reading “Biden and His Aides Pushed America Into Syria’s Civil War a Decade Ago”

Joe Biden has been president for two months. Only 46 months to go, unless he is reelected. In fact, he teased the media at his press conference, suggesting that he likely would run for reelection, though he insisted that prospect was too far in the future for him to consider today. The biggest change from … Continue reading “After Two Months, President Joe Biden has Become Donald Trump Lite on Foreign Policy”

For all their talk of peace through strength, American hawks favor windbag diplomacy. In their view there is no international problem that cannot be solved with theatrical hyperventilating leavened by threats and insults. The more serious the challenge, the more they bloviate. Failure only inflates their inner windbag. President Donald Trump and Secretary of State … Continue reading “The Failure of Huff and Puff Foreign Policy”

Several Burmese police fled across the border into India. One of them told the Associated Press that they had been ordered to "shoot people and not just the people, we were told to shoot our own family if they are not on the side of the army," known as the Tatmadaw. The disparate group of … Continue reading “Burmese Junta Wages War on Its Own People”

War fires the imagination, especially of those who never suffered its horrors. Washington, D.C.’s faux heroes find nothing so courageous as sending other people off to fight and die in one grand cause or another. Of course, some professionals glory in death and gore, such as World War II’s Gen. George S. Patton. In his … Continue reading “Drafting People Into the Moral Equivalent of War”

Friday is the 18th anniversary of George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq. That misadventure proved to be a humanitarian catastrophe. As well as Washington’s worst geopolitical blunder in four decades. Tragically, America’s involvement is the misbegotten gift that keeps on giving – and killing. President Joe Biden should bring America’s troops home from Iraq. Now. … Continue reading “Bring Americans Home from Iraq’s Endless War”