I’ve always been of the impression that the likelihood for Chinese imperial ambition is a weak one. Historically, China, due to its ethnocentricity, concluded imperial conquest beyond its immediate borders (Tibet, Mongolia, etc.) to be unworthy of its attention. But recently I stumbled across a compelling argument in Richard Cooper’s The Breaking of Nations in [...]
Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
On Chinese and Indian Imperial Ambitions…?
Posted in Uncategorized on August 12, 2009 | 5 Comments »
Democracy and the Myopia of US Foreign Policy
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Grand Strategy, National Interest, Democracy Promotion on August 11, 2009 | 2 Comments »
For two decades, American foreign policy has been marked by reactionary, ad-hoc, and short-term responses to various international crises and a general paucity of long-term strategic planning. Much of the blame lies with the shoddy judgment of Clinton and Bush II regarding Islamic terrorism; the first underestimated and under-reacted to the terror threat, while the [...]
Russian Revanchism via Petrobrinkmanship
Posted in Uncategorized on August 3, 2009 | 8 Comments »
One of the foremost geopolitical concerns of the United States is Russian revanchism. Russia has a centuries long history of outward expansion and imperial conquest. It’s constantly pushed its borders outward, incorporating newly subdued ethnic groups into the Russian empire. There are two primary reasons for this propensity towards imperialism. First, Russia’s lack of [...]
On Troop Extrication in Iraq
Posted in Uncategorized on August 2, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Guests, like fish, begin to smell after three days.”
That’s the idiom being evoked by Gen. Ray Odierno, a senior military adviser in Baghdad, who recently issued a memorandum arguing that it’s time for the “US to declare victory and go home” (see the NY Times article). Odierno believes Iraqi forces are sufficient enough to meet [...]
Foreign policy miscalculations: Why FP outcomes haven’t changed since Bush
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged foreign policy, obama doctrine on July 29, 2009 | 1 Comment »
Michael Gerson writes about the disappointing outcomes (thus far) of Obama’s foreign policy of “engagement”. I predicted the catch-22 inherent in Obama’s foreign policy promises elsewhere (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6). My point today: Obama’s folly was based on faulty assumptions about (1) his own abilities, (2) the motives and interests of state actors, [...]
Scowcroft and Brzezinski on a European Military
Posted in Uncategorized on July 24, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Brent Scowcroft and Zbigniew Brzezinksi, two former National Security Advisers, maintain a differing opinion on a united European military force than does Henry Kissinger, one of the foremost modern practitioners of Realpolitik. Interestingly, all three are committed realists.
Brzezinski, who served as a the NSA to President Carter, argues that a more capable and integrated European [...]
Obstacles to Intensfying Economic Sanctions against Iran
Posted in Middle-East, energy, nuclear proliferation, tagged Europe, geopolitics, Iran, missile defense, nuclear proliferation, Obama, Russia on July 17, 2009 | 1 Comment »
The recent events in Iran have led to posts on the importance of increasing the intensity of and solidifying the international will for economic sanctions (see posts here and here). The intent of intensifying economic sanctions is to force a shift in how Iran calculates the costs of pursuing a weapons program. Due to the [...]
An Iconoclast in the Carpeting Industry
Posted in Uncategorized on July 17, 2009 | 1 Comment »
Pioneer of The Norwegian Method, Ryan Decker, is 25 today. Entering the industry at a time of uncertainty and change, Decker quickly took advantage of the opportunities afforded him to gain the skills and vision which would later characterize his work. Frequently derided by colleagues with less scope and ambition as shrill and neurotic to [...]
The Moral Inconsistency of Drone Attacks and the Fog of War
Posted in Uncategorized on July 16, 2009 | 5 Comments »
There is an interesting moral dilemma to examine regarding Obama’s presidential directive to increase drone-attacks within Northern Pakistan. Bush was heavily criticized for his heavy-handed actions in the Middle-East that has, as many on the left argue, increased hostilities towards America. One such policy was his use of drone-attacks in which a remote controlled [...]
Engaging Iran
Posted in Uncategorized on July 15, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Engaging Iran In response to Tehran’s brutal repression of its citizens, some experts are calling for an indefinite shelving of US-Iranian negotiations. The rational of these experts is democracy promotion and a commitment to American ideals; the US shouldn’t negotiate with regimes that violate its citizen’s rights. To shelve negotiations with Iran, however, would [...]
