Foreign Policy

General Clark delivered the keynote address at this special event, where an honest assessment of the United States' foreign policy drove a lively discussion. The morning began with Steve Clemons and John O'Sullivan leading a discussion on "Benchmarking Successes and Failures: The Condition of America's Great Purposes and Evolving 21st Century Challenges". Next, a panel of experts discussed "Global Outlooks: American Grand Strategy and Widening Arcs of Instability."

When nations go to war, government spending goes up. First for the fighting, then for the social-welfaring.

So all the fond dreams of reducing the size and cost of government in the years ahead are just that--fond dreams and nothing more. If a country calls its young people to rally to the colors, it had better be prepared to pay for their service, in the short run and also the long run. To do otherwise is to risk disaster, on the homefront as well as the warfront.

"Link found between hatred and killing" is not a headline that would sell many newspapers. But you might turn a few heads with "Link between hatred and killing changes in ominous way." Or--to put a finer point on it--"Ratio of killing to hatred slated to rise." This is one of the biggest stories of the last 30 years and, probably, the next 30 years: the growing lethality of hatred.

According to futurist-strategist Herman Kahn, the most important fact about the 20th century is that America and Britain shared the same language.

But an upcoming movie, The New World, offers a look at the long-ago origins of that alliance--and questions its moral implications.

A tearjerker from the 1970s starring Ali McGraw and Ryan O'Neal popularized the adage "Love Means Never Having to Say You're Sorry." That maxim may work in romance -- although even that is doubtful -- but it is certainly not good for dealing with a weak and critical ally.

Since 9/11, the American psyche has been haunted by Osama bin Laden. Numerous military operations attempting his capture have failed, and what little is known about him has been obscured by anecdote and myth -- until now. Join the New America Foundation for a fascinating discussion with Peter Bergen, Terrorism Analyst for CNN and author of the New York Times best seller Holy War, Inc., about his just-released book, The Osama bin Laden I Know: An Oral History of al Qaeda's Leader.

Should the Caliphate be reunited? It depends on whom you ask. Osama Bin Laden is for such a reunification of all Muslims, which is surely enough to persuade most Americans to oppose it.

America lost Iraq as soon as it won the war. A pervasive sense of lawlessness set in immediately following the fall of Saddam's regime from which neither Iraq nor the Americans ever recovered. On the ground, it was apparent from the first month of the occupation that things would be much worse than anybody had imagined.

Russia and Ukraine have ended their spat over natural gas prices. Ukraine will pay more, but much less than Russia originally demanded. That's the good news.

The bad news is that the outcome owed little to Western diplomacy. Ukraine, a budding democracy, deserves Western support. Europe squawked when Russia cut its gas supplies, but that hardly amounted to a coherent policy of backing Ukraine against what was a huge--albeit spectacularly inept--Russian power play.

With the Russian-Ukrainian gas dispute now settled, in a murky but apparently satisfactory fashion, it is time to reflect on what the affair says about the West's relations with Russia and, still more important, the West's relations with Ukraine.

The reason a serious debate is necessary is that the West's strategy toward Ukraine has been founded on a bizarre illusion: that Ukraine would leave Russia's orbit and "join the West," and that Russia would pay for this process.