Outside the Beltway

Could anyone have imagined a decade ago a scenario when the United States would go to war with France by our side and England on the sidelines?

An Example of How Institutions Matter.

Persuasion is sometimes an important part of being president.

The United States will go to war without UN or NATO approval.

The White House confirmed today that the goal of any military intervention in Syria would be very limited. Which makes one wonder what the point of doing anything actually is.

There’s more than one way to look at the civil war in Syria.

We’re almost certainly going to launch punitive strikes against Syria. They’ll almost certainly be ineffective.

United States helped Saddam Hussein launch some of the worst chemical attacks in history against Iran.

John Kerry’s speech was the crossing of the Rubicon for US military action in Syria.

Western military action in the Syrian civil war now appears likely.

In both Egypt and Syria, it’s damned if we do and damned if we don’t.

As President Obama’s red line has been crossed more brazenly, he continues to sound reluctant to intervene in Syria while positioning forces to do just that.

Walter Russell Mead explains why a well intentioned, carefully crafted and consistently pursued grand strategy failed.

A headline I never thought I’d see: “Yemen Asks U.S. For Drones To Fight Al Qaeda”

Andrew Bacevich argues, persuasively, that “absence of leverage does not preclude options” with respect to Egypt.

Does interest in Egypt make the same sense it did 30 years ago?

The Obama administration has issued a strongly worded statement on this morning’s massacre by the Egyptian government.

Hundreds are dead as Egypt’s military government crack down on supporters of the democratically elected government they ousted.

Some conservatives don’t seem too troubled by Vladimir Putin’s repression.

Bill Clark, who served as National Security Advisor and Interior Secretary under Ronald Reagan, has died at 81.

The Pentagon is considering doing away with two combatant commands—and no longer calling them combatant commands.

Japan’s National Debt has reached a level that’s somewhat incomprehensible.

The architect of President Obama’s re-election campaign is going to work for the Tories.

Al Qaeda may be up to something, so take no chances.