Holbrooke’s Legacy

As the panegyrics to Richard Holbrooke spread over the internet like a thickening fog, the real legacy of this State Department apparatchik came across the news wires a few hours after his death: “Kosovo’s prime minister is the head of a “mafia-like” Albanian group responsible for smuggling weapons, drugs and human organs through eastern Europe, … Continue reading “Holbrooke’s Legacy”

Richard Holbrooke: Bulldozer Stuck in the Mud

Strobe Talbott once called Richard Holbrooke the "diplomatic equivalent of a hydrogen bomb." Oh, the many ways we could interpret that today. When Talbott, Bill Clinton’s deputy secretary of state and a friend of Holbrooke, made that comment to the New York Times in February 2009, Holbrooke was riding a wave of fairly breathless publicity … Continue reading “Richard Holbrooke: Bulldozer Stuck in the Mud”