Alan Bock

There’s been a distinct shift in the way U.S. officials talk not only about the war on terror, but about the "mission" in Iraq. As the International Herald Tribune noted in a story Wednesday, the "global war on terror" has been transmogrified into "a global struggle against violent extremism," as Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman … Continue reading “Reality Bites Back”

It is perhaps a sad commentary that daily bombings and deaths, mostly among Iraqi civilians, are considered so relatively normal that it seems all right to focus on other parts of the world this week. Unfortunately, chaos of a kind that few reasonably realistic observers, including most military figures and even Secretary of Defense Don … Continue reading “Common Sense About India?”

I don’t remember how long I have been using Leon Hadar for his insights into the Middle East and the complications engendered by the prolonged and increasingly aggressive American interventions – indeed, as Leon puts it, the ongoing efforts to establish the United States as the hegemonic power – in that endemically troubled region. The … Continue reading “In Search of a New Middle Eastern Paradigm”

"And the contrast couldn’t be clearer," quoth Dubya, "between the intentions and the hearts of those of us who care deeply about human rights and human liberty, and those who kill – those who have got such evil in their heart that they will take the lives of innocent folks." Well, not exactly. Leave aside … Continue reading “Terror Strikes Again”

I see President Bush’s speech Tuesday as a bit of evidence that the empire, at the very moment it seems to hold sway over all and sundry as the “sole superpower,” is in serious decline. That the putatively most powerful man in the world should have so little insight not only into what to do … Continue reading “Signs of Decline”

I can certainly sympathize with Michigan Democrat Rep. John Conyers and various of his sympathizers, who sponsored a forum last week in the House to discuss the notorious Downing Street memo and to promote the idea that Congress should conduct an official inquiry into whether President Bush intentionally misled the nation into the Iraq war. … Continue reading “Smoking Gun Misfiring?”

Somewhere during the aftermath of the news that Mark Felt, formerly Number 2 at the FBI, was the fabled "Deep Throat" source for then-Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, I heard former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger pontificating on Fox News to this effect: "’Hero’ is not the first word that comes to … Continue reading “Shallow Thoughts on Deep Throat”

Afghanistan, where in recent weeks U.S. troops have been killed at a higher rate than in Iraq, has evolved into something of a classic imperial dilemma for the United States. The administration desperately wants to put the best possible face on the situation there, insisting that democracy (in the incantatory sense rather than using that … Continue reading “Afghanistan: An Imperial Dilemma”

What is perhaps most striking about the tussle between Newsweek and its critics is how similarly the two sides operate in the way they treat the implications that are proper to draw from bare facts. There’s something to what critics like Thomas Sowell say about Newsweek and other minions of the fabled MSM. As Sowell … Continue reading “Looking-Glass Wars”

Last week I wrote about some of the reasons it is just possible that we won’t see another major imperial military adventure during the Bushlet’s second term. The reasons ranged from the second-term blues that afflicts most two-term presidencies, to the resources tied up (or tied down) in Iraq, to the fact that North Korea … Continue reading “Tired of Empire?”