Abdullah I bin al-Hussein fought along side Lawrence of Arabia against the Ottoman Empire and became Emir of Transjordan and…
“It’s not Washington’s job to tell Iraq who its leaders should be”
In his lengthy article for the Washington Post, Ali Khedery contended that the U.S. backed Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki long…
An Enemy of King Fahd of Saudi Arabia
King Fahd ruled Saudi Arabia from 1982 to 2005, leading it in a strong alliance with the United States and…
Why We Stuck with Maliki — and Lost Iraq
To understand why Iraq is imploding, you must understand Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki — and why the United States has…
Pot Shards
Back to Diplomats and Diplomacy Pot Shards: Fragments of a Life Lived in CIA, the White House, and the Two Koreas…
The 1974 Turkish Intervention in Cyprus
The “Cyprus problem” of ongoing conflict between the Greeks and Turks on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus came to a…
The Iraqi Revolution — of 1958
In 1958, the 14 July Revolution ended the thirty-seven-year Hashemite monarchy of Iraq in a coup d’état and established the…
The Whistle-Blower: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers
“We were young, we were foolish, we were arrogant, but we were right.” —Daniel Ellsberg The recent issue of NSA…
The Fog of War – Investigating a U.S. Airstrike on an Afghan Wedding Party
On July 1, 2002, a U.S. airstrike in the town of Deh Rawood, Afghanistan killed dozens of civilians at a…
France has de Gaulle to Withdraw from NATO
On June 21, 1966, France made the somewhat shocking move to withdraw its troops from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization…