According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the United States spent $21 trillion on its military between 2001 and 2024 (in constant 2024 dollars), equal to the combined military spending of the next eighteen countries. Iran barely made...
The 60-day extension of the ceasefire between the United States and Iran may lead to lasting peace or it may be over within a week, doomed by the dysfunctional alliance between the US and Israel. If it holds, it could mark the beginning of a transition away from the...
Empires rise and fall. They do not last forever. Imperial declines follow a gradual shifting of the economic tides, but are also punctuated and defined by critical tipping points. There are many differences between the Suez Crisis in 1956 and the US war on Iran today,...
The US government under Donald Trump has twice used disingenuous negotiations with Iran to provide cover for attacking it, in June 2025 and again before launching the current war in February. Now it is trying to do so for a third time. On April 8, the US and Iran...
After the breakdown of talks in Pakistan, the ceasefire between the US and Iran is more fragile than ever, and now seems likely to give way to a new phase of the war. The ceasefire and talks have failed to end Israel’s devastating attacks on Lebanon or to negotiate...
For decades, the United States moved from covert assassination plots to openly embracing assassination or “targeted killing” as policy. Now, in its war with Iran, that evolution is reaching its most dangerous phase. On March 17th and 18th, the United States and Israel...
The United States has once again launched a war in the Middle East based on false claims about weapons of mass destruction. Like the invasion of Iraq in 2003, the U.S. assault on Iran rests on allegations that international inspectors have already debunked. But beyond...
After some delays, the United States is dispatching a second aircraft-carrier, the USS Gerald R. Ford, from the Caribbean to the Middle East to join the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group and threaten Iran. This is the third Atlantic crossing for the Ford’s crew...
At the opening ceremony for Donald Trump’s so-called Board of Peace in Davos, Jared Kushner unveiled glossy images of his vision for a “new Gaza”: shining apartment towers, luxury developments, and sweeping views of the Mediterranean. There were no Palestinians at the...
Donald Trump campaigned on ending endless wars and now boasts that he has resolved eight wars. In reality, this claim is delusional, and his foreign policy is a disaster. The United States remains mired in ongoing wars in the Middle East and Ukraine, and now Trump is...
