[This is an edited version of a talk I delivered in July of 2025, shortly after the U.S. launched massive attacks on Iran’s nuclear sites.] The big news in foreign policy is that President Trump ordered the bombing of Iran’s nuclear facilities. No doubt, some of you are wondering how to evaluate that decision. Does
If you want a clue to the basic reason behind Trump’s capitulating “Memorandum of Understanding” with Iran just read his attempted justification for allowing the Iranians to keep their ballistic missiles: “I mean, they have to have some, because other people have some. . . . I’m saying that if other countries have them, it’s
The premise behind the recent Trump-Kim summit was that if we negotiate an exchange—if we give the North Koreans something that they want and they give us the denuclearization that we want—everyone comes out ahead. That premise rests on a fraud. The easiest way to see the nature of this fraud is to ask a
President Trump has embraced Saudi Arabia, praising it as an ally in the battle against Islamic jihadists. As Secretary of State Rex Tillerson explains this new relationship: “The president clearly was extending a hand and understanding that only together can we address the threat of terrorism.” This is a decision, however, that will only advance
Forget about the intricate details of our nuclear agreement with Iran–the number of centrifuges permitted, the degree of uranium enrichment allowed, the amount of advance notification required before inspectors can visit a nuclear facility. There is really only one question that matters: If Iran poses a physical threat to America—if we have reason to fear
[This article was expanded into “Dealing with Iran: Self-Interest vs. Self-Sacrifice.”] Forget about the intricate details of our nuclear agreement with Iran—the number of centrifuges permitted, the degree of uranium enrichment allowed, the amount of advance notification required before inspectors can visit a nuclear facility. There is really only one question that matters: If an
I’ve written on the libertarians’ use of “non-interventionism” as a deceptive term to disguise their tacit kinship with anarchists. An article last month by a senior fellow at the Cato Institute provides a good illustration. In “Will America Ever Learn From Its Middle East Mistakes,” Ted Galen Carpenter argues against taking any military action against
By Peter Schwartz (Bucks County Courier Times, October 27, 2003; Providence Journal, April 11, 2004) As U.S. soldiers respond to attacks in Fallujah and elsewhere in Iraq, many commentators warn that a forceful, self-assertive campaign to wipe out the militant resistance would be disastrous. Disaster may indeed be looming—but only because of a lack of