foreign policy

• 
• SOURCE: TomDispatch
  10/18/2020
  

  Reframing America’s Role in the World: The Specter of Isolationism

  by Andrew Bacevich

  The release of Stephen Wertheim's book shoud prompt a reconsideration of American intervention abroad. 

• 
• SOURCE: Boston Review
  10/19/2020
  

  Why Is America the World’s Police? (Review)

  by Sam Lebovic

  A review of Stephen Wertheim's "Tomorrow, The World" concludes the new book shows how American military supremacy moved in a generation from a novel idea to embedded common sense, and demands rethinking the resources spent to maintain it. 

• 
• SOURCE: New York Times
  10/15/2020
  

  America Has No Reason to Be So Powerful

  by Stephen Wertheim

  "There was a time when Americans believed that armed dominance obstructed and corrupted genuine engagement in the world, far from being its foundation."

• 
• SOURCE: Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft
  9/28/2020
  

  Stephen Wertheim's "Tomorrow the World: The Birth of US Global Supremacy" (video)

  In his new book, Tomorrow, the World, Stephen Wertheim reveals how American leaders suddenly and unexpectedly decided to turn the United States into the world's armed superpower — and never looked back.

• 
• SOURCE: The New Yorker
  10/1/2020
  

  How Trump Brought Home the Endless War

  by Stephen Wertheim

  The Global War on Terror reconfigured American foreign policy around military force against abstract ideas and indeterminate enemies. The divisions of domestic politics set the stage for Donald Trump to move the war to the streets of the United States. 

• 
• SOURCE: New Statesman
  9/23/2020
  

  Would Biden or Trump End America's Forever Wars?

  Stephen Wertheim questions whether politicians will heed the overwhelming public desire to scale back military intervention and get the Pentagon's spending under control. 

• 
• SOURCE: Foreign Affairs
  9/18/2020
  

  The Endless Fantasy of American Power

  by Andrew Bacevich

  Neither Trump nor Biden seems prepared to do the necessary work of moving military power and force from the center of American foreign policy. The consequence will be further endless war at the expense of the global-scale policies needed to confront the most urgent threats.

• 
• 9/27/2020
  

  Where Does the Democratic Party Stand on War, Peace, and International Relations?

  by Lawrence Wittner

  While moving from a party platform to a change in policy is difficult, especially where the Pentagon is concerned, the Democrats seem to recognize a broad-based desire to return America to international cooperation and allocate resources to other national priorities like public health. 

• 
• 9/13/2020
  

  Richard Haass on the Need for Historically Informed Policy in a Changing World

  by David O'Connor

  "A democracy requires that its citizens be informed, and it was evident far too many citizens in the United States and other countries could not be described as globally literate."

• 
• SOURCE: National History Center
  9/10/2020
  

  TODAY: Henry Kissinger and American Power: A Political Biography

  The National History Center and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars host a virtual discussion today featuring Thomas Schwartz, author of "Henry Kissinger: A Political Biography." 

• 
• SOURCE: War on the Rocks
  9/4/2020
  

  Topics You’re Not Supposed To Discuss At Dinner: The Role Of Evangelical Religion In U.S. Foreign Policy (Podcast)

  Lauren Turek, Ashlyn Hand and William Inboden discuss how, as Turek documents, in the late 20th century, the specific notion of human rights intersected with evangelical missionaries and their perceptions of the risks associated with communism and other important foreign policy questions, and were able to organize and influence U.S. foreign policy in a new and important way.

• 
• SOURCE: New York Times
  9/3/2020
  

  The Terrible Cost of Presidential Racism

  by Gary Bass

  The emotional displays of prejudice revealed by newly uncensored White House tapes involving Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger help to explain a foreign policy debacle. 

• 
• SOURCE: Perspectives on History
  8/20/2020
  

  Between Africa and America: Recalibrating Black Americans' Relationship to the Diaspora

  by Nemata Blyden and Jeannette Eileen Jones

  Black people in the United States have maintained their own relationships with Africa—dating back to the 17th century—despite official US policy regarding the continent.

• 
• SOURCE: Boston Review
  8/18/2020
  

  The Conceit of American Indispensability [review]

  In his new book, Samuel Zipp Zipp explores the resonance of Willkie’s international ideas through the story of his most quixotic venture.

• 
• SOURCE: New York Times
  8/12/2020
  

  Regrets? Even Brent Scowcroft Had a Few

  In an oral history released after his death, the former national security adviser revealed a few key moments in which his ideas failed in the war against Saddam Hussein.    

• 
• SOURCE: Foreign Affairs
  8/11/2020
  

  Present at the Disruption: How Trump Unmade U.S. Foreign Policy

  by Richard Haass

  Disruption is not necessarily a bad thing. But Donald Trump's foreign policy has disrupted existing arrangements without viable substitutes and made the United States and the world worse off. 

• 
• SOURCE: The New Republic
  8/13/2020
  

  The Inevitability of Defending Henry Kissinger

  by Jim Sleeper

  A new book on the Cold War statesman offers a dangerous justification for the unaccountability of powerful figures. 

• 
• SOURCE: Business Insider
  7/2/2020
  

  Democrats May Beat Trump in November and Still not Learn the Most Important Lesson from his Presidency

  by Daniel Bessner

  Democrats must not just defeat Trump; they must commit to fighting a culture of elite impunity that has enabled the rise of Trump and an unaccountable Republican Party. 

• 
• 6/7/2020
  

  Turning Points and Roads Not Taken in American Foreign Policy

  by Roger Peace

  The end of the Cold War presented an opportunity for American foreign policy to turn away from militarism and toward cooperative development. The COVID-19 pandemic is the latest consequence of failing to secure a "peace dividend."

• 
• SOURCE: New York Times
  5/10/2020
  

  Can the Democrats Avoid Trump’s China Trap?

  by Rachel Esplin Odell and Stephen Wertheim

  We stand on the brink of an even more destructive and less justifiable mistake than the post-Sept. 11 crusade.