Thank God for Helen Thomas, the only person to show any courage at the White House press briefing after President Barack Obama gave a flaccid account of the intelligence screw-up that almost downed an airliner on Christmas Day. After Obama briefly addressed L'Affaire...
What I call the Weird Factor, for lack of a better name, seems to have become a permanent feature of our post-9/11 world, a dark and sinister leitmotif that plays in the background. On 9/11, of course, the Factor was on full display as a whole string of unusual events...
It is not widely understood that the policy objective of al-Qaeda is not to attack the Western countries, which in itself accomplishes nothing. Bringing down a Western airliner or blowing up a building in the United States or Britain is of no interest in itself, since...
It has been eight years since al-Qaeda attacked the Twin Towers and the Pentagon: eight long years in which the "war on terrorism" – begun by George W. Bush in a blaze of righteousness, and since carried on by his successor, in Afghanistan and Pakistan – has...
The attempted Christmas Day bombing of a U.S. airliner by a Nigerian allegedly associated with al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) has propelled long-neglected Yemen into the media spotlight. The attempt, which was foiled by alert passengers who subdued the...
The Barack Obama administration is refusing to acknowledge an offer by the leadership of the Taliban in early December to give "legal guarantees" that it will not allow Afghanistan to be used for attacks on other countries. The administration's silence on...
President Barack Obama presented a case Tuesday for sending 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan that included both soaring rhetoric and a new emphasis on its necessity for U.S. national security. Obama said the escalation was for a "vital national...
Afghanistan has become a Mel Brooks movie. President Hamid Karzai handpicked an election commission that threw the election his way. UN overseers declared the election was crooked and decreed that a runoff was required. Karzai didn't want to face a runoff, but John...
There has always been in American foreign policy circles a virus called arrogance, caused by the hereditary assumption that Americans know better than others. Surprisingly, this does not always prove the case, but the condition seems highly resistant to treatment,...
U.S. national security officials, concerned that President Barack Obama might be abandoning the strategy of full-fledged counterinsurgency war in Afghanistan, are claiming new intelligence assessments suggesting that al-Qaeda would be allowed to return to Afghanistan...
