Back in the Eternal City after three years, and there is another political scandal on the horizon. Or at least the local media machine (every bit as bad as its U.S. equivalent) would have us believe there was. The target: Matteo Salvini, Italy’s famously Euroskeptic interior minister. The accusation: corrupt dealings between his Lega party...
Last Sunday President Trump triggered off a major controversy with a series of tweets directed at Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) and Ayanna Pressley (D-MA). The president berated the far-left quartet for “telling the people of the United States…how our government is to be run,” and suggested that they should...
Last Wednesday China completed a major naval exercise in the disputed waters of the South China Sea. On July 3 it was reported that China was testing a new naval helicopter which “could fill a big gap” in its expanding fleet. Over the weekend, Australian media reported that the country’s navy was monitoring a Chinese...
“Everything in strategy is very simple,” Carl von Clausewitz wrote almost two centuries ago, “but that does not mean that everything is very easy.” The author of On War said it is easy to chart the course of a war once begun, but “great strength of character, as well as great lucidity and firmness of...
A hundred years ago, on June 28, 1919, the Treaty of Versailles was signed in the illustrious Hall of Mirrors, the same spot where the German Empire was proclaimed in January 1871. It was the most ambitious gathering of its kind in history. Leaders and diplomats of 27 nations convened to establish a new order...
Judging by the corporate media obituaries, “Egypt’s first democratically elected president”–who died while on trial in a Cairo courtroom on June 17–was a well-meaning but inept leader who “governed clumsily” before being overthrown by the military. In reality Mohamed Morsi was an Islamist supremacist. He tried to use his narrow electoral victory in 2012 to...
To Mike Pompeo’s and John Bolton’s great regret, the conspiracy to push the U.S. into yet another war in the Middle East—likely more catastrophic in cost and consequences than all previous ones taken together—has been averted, for now at least. For several months until the end of May, tensions between the United Stated and Iran...
Early legislative elections in Israel on April 9 have not changed the country’s political landscape. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been reelected for an unprecedented fourth consecutive term and will soon exceed the late David Ben-Gurion’s record of 13 years and four months in office. His Likud with 35 seats will be supported by several...
The trouble with last week’s elections for the European Parliament is that its results offer grounds for widely different interpretations of their meaning. Too many glasses are half-full or half-empty. One thing is certain: the upsurge of Euroskeptic, sovereignist-identitarian parties – feared by some, hoped for by others – has not materialized. The EU is...
Donald Trump won in November 2016 in part because he had promised to turn a new leaf in America’s global engagements. Three years ago he spoke against his opponent’s imperial delusions, voiced doubt about the utility of NATO, expressed certainty that he’d find a common language with Putin (declaring Crimea none of our business), promised...
A new round in the U.S.-China trade dispute has started in earnest. Last Sunday (May 5) President Donald Trump tweeted that he would raise the current 10 percent tariff on $200 billion worth of Chinese imports to 25 percent. The President doubled down on his trade war threats with China early today (May 10), just hours after last...
The crisis in Venezuela, instigated and stage-managed by the mighty interventionist clique within the Trump Administration, presents in a distilled form the neoconservative global repertoire. Its key traits are mendacity, arrogance, contempt for all legal and moral norms, bloodlust, avarice, and disregard for any rationally based understanding of the American interest. On Tuesday morning Venezuelan...
Violent incidents, perpetrated by the opponents of a tyrannical regime, tend to enable such regimes to become openly terrorist. They may have been on a brutal trajectory all along, but their enemies’ acts of desperate defiance (or plain insanity) often facilitate their transition to the level of oppression which had been desired all along. Charlotte...
The headlines were familiar, The New York Times setting the tone: “In Attacking Ilhan Omar, Trump Revives His Familiar Refrain Against Muslims.” According to the media pack the President is seeking to rally his base by reviving allegedly “Islamophobic” themes of his 2016 campaign. His detractors notably ignore the question what exactly is the message...
Julian Assange’s arrest inside the embassy of Ecuador in London would not have been possible had that country’s government not authorized the British police to enter its theoretically sovereign territory. The lesson is clear: if you plan to seek asylum in a foreign embassy, you should be careful to choose the diplomatic premises of a...
Twenty years ago the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, led by the United States, waged a relentless 78-day bombing campaign against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, consisting of Serbia and Montenegro (March 24-June 10, 1999). This act of naked illegal aggression marked a significant turning point, not only for America and NATO but also for everyone...
President Donald Trump’s predecessors have circumvented Congress before on issues the legislative branch had tried to stop. They have redirected resources appropriated by lawmakers. They have resorted to the same National Emergencies Act that Trump is invoking in order to build the Wall along the country’s southern border. None of their actions triggered a reaction...
Now that the Russian Collusion Myth has been revealed to be a mendacious conspiracy by the Deep State, the Democratic Party and the media, President Donald Trump needs to move on with his election promise to improve relations with Moscow. That is a geopolitical and civilizational necessity. It is essential to note that the same...
Terrorist attacks against Muslims in the Western world are extremely rare. This morning’s carnage in two mosques in New Zealand, with the death toll currently at 50, is the first major event of its kind since the Quebec City mosque shooting—over two years ago – which killed six persons. (As for the alleged “Islamophobic incidents”...
Last month’s suicide bomb attack in the disputed province of Kashmir, which killed 40 members of India’s security forces, suddenly brought two old rivals to the brink of war. India and Pakistan had fought three of them between the Partition and 1971. They have been at peace since, uneasy at times, which provides evidence for...
Visiting Brussels is like visiting an acquaintance who is well informed but whose company you don’t enjoy. It is not fun but it can be useful. The European Union is in a state of latent crisis which has the potential to turn acute at any moment, but the massive bureaucratic machine in its capital pretends...
Pope Francis, the first Pontiff to visit the Arabian Peninsula, attended a hugely publicized interfaith meeting in the United Arab Emirates on February 4 as part of what the Vatican described as his “outreach to the Muslim world.” The following day he held an open-air Mass in Abu Dhabi, attended by 135,000 Catholic guest workers...
On February 19, Serbia’s Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic received Venezuela’s Deputy FM Ivan Hill and reiterated Serbia’s position of non-interference in other countries’ internal affairs. The following day U.S. Ambassador in Belgrade Kyle Scott responded with a tweet (in Serbian), warning that “Serbia is on the wrong side of history” for not recognizing “the provisional...
President Donald Trump has declared a national emergency to fund the wall along the nation’s southern border. Speaking in the Rose Garden, Trump said there was an emergency at the border which could only be fixed by building a wall. House speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer had said before Trump’s address...
In the course of his 48-hour visit to the United Arab Emirates, Pope Francis addressed an “interreligious meeting” in Abu Dhabi on February 4 and celebrated an open-air Mass attended by 135,000 Catholic guest workers the following day. His homily at the city’s Zayed Sports Stadium, inspired by the Sermon on the Mount, was unremarkable but...
Pope Francis arrived in the United Arab Emirates yesterday, February 3. Tonight he will address the “Muslim Council of Elders,” a body based in the UAE which supposedly “seeks to counter religious fanaticism by promoting a moderate brand of Islam.” We’ll reserve our judgment until we see the text of his speech (cf. Part II...
President Donald Trump’s announcement last December 19 that he would immediately withdraw all U.S. forces from Syria (and one-half of the Afghan contingent) is the most important single decision of his presidency. The mission in Syria had never been about “regime change” in Damascus, or “eliminating Iranian influence,” or establishing Kurdish autonomy. Two years ago...
My “Letter from Egypt,” with a comprehensive analysis of the country’s political, economic and social situation is coming in a few days’ time. For starters, let me present our readers with a few practical tips on how to make the most of this incredible country without spending many thousands of dollars/euros and without being herded...
The Financial Times has selected George Soros as its Person of the Year. According to the paper, this choice was made both as a reflection of his achievements and for the values he represents: He is the standard bearer of liberal democracy and open society… For more than three decades, Mr Soros has used philanthropy...
France’s ambassador to Poland Pierre Levy has said he was “surprised, even shocked,” by the Polish foreign minister, Jacek Czaputowicz, declaring that “something’s not right” with France, and that was “sad because France is the sick man of Europe, dragging Europe down.” M. Levy went on to make an astonishing statement which only confirmed that...
The Paris Peace Conference opened at the Palace of Versailles 100 years ago (January 18, 1919). It was the most ambitious gathering of its kind in history: Leaders and diplomats of 27 nations convened to shape the future, a mere ten weeks after the Armistice. Far from reestablishing order in Europe and the world after...
Over the next few weeks President Donald Trump will have to wage the toughest battle of his political career so far. He will be under intense political and bureaucratic pressure to change his mind on the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Syria. Trump needs to resist that pressure both because the decision to withdraw is...
On a recent sunny afternoon—a wonderful rarity in Holland’s late fall—I visited Huis Doorn, the country manor 15 miles east of Utrecht where Kaiser Wilhelm II Hohenzollern spent just over two decades in exile before dying there in early June 1941. His lead coffin, draped in the Imperial flag, lies in the middle of a...
The reaction of top U.S. Senators from both parties to the briefing by CIA director Gina Haspel on the killing of Jamal Khashoggi has been unprecedented. A close ally of President Trump, Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC), announced that he had “high confidence” Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was complicit in the murder, describing the Saudi...
Jair Bolsonaro won the presidential election in Brazil on October 28 with 55 percent of the vote. The former army captain triumphed over Fernando Haddad of the leftist Workers’ Party pledging to fight crime and corruption, to end affirmative action for “disadvantaged minorities,” and to shatter the straitjacketed discourse on race and sexuality. The leader...
“America First! The world is a very dangerous place!” President Donald J. Trump’s opening of his statement on “Standing with Saudi Arabia” (November 20) was eccentric; the ensuing 600-odd words—indubitably his own—appeared to give Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (“MbS”) an unqualified and outrageous carte blanche, seven weeks after Jamal Khashoggi’s murder. There may be...
After four years and three months of unprecedented carnage, the Great War—the most catastrophic event in all of history—ended one hundred years ago, on November 11, 1918. That war destroyed an effervescent civilization, unmatched in its fruits and vigor. A decent and on the whole well-ordered world was wrecked for ever, thrown into the abyss...
Angela Merkel announced on October 29 that she would make a two-stage exit from the political scene. She is first giving up her chairmanship of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), which will select a new leader at its party congress on December 7-8. She is to step down as chancellor next, but not before the...
President Donald Trump’s speech to the U.N. General Assembly on September 25 was met with audible disrespect from some of the assembled globalist cognoscenti (representatives of many barbarous regimes included), and with blind hostility from the media and commentariat. This was unsurprising, because the opening segment of his half-hour address sounded like the summary of...
It is the duty of every Muslim to emulate the example of his prophet as recorded in the Hadith. By ordering the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, Prince Mohammad bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud has only acted in accordance with that orthodox, 14-century-old principle. It would have been eminently un-Islamic, in fact, for “MbS” to...
In the aftermath of the murder of Jamal Khashoggi inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, the question has been raised whether the U.S.-Saudi alliance can or should be saved. It is based on false premises: there is no such alliance. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is neither a friend nor an ally of America. It...
Over the past few weeks we have witnessed a rapid and (for the past half-century) unprecedented worsening of relations between the United States and China. It is uncertain, for now, whether this is the result of a deliberate shift in strategy by Washington or the cumulative effect of a series of incremental moves and counter-moves...
Sen. John McCain’s death at 81 on August 25 was followed by effusive praise from everyone who is anyone in the Permanent State. His memorial service at Washington’s National Cathedral on September 1 confirmed that, inside the Beltway, even death is eminently political. It was the biggest gathering of the nation’s bipartisan establishment and its...
Greece is lovely most of the time and irresistible in the late summer, so I am back for a second stint in two months. Mercifully there are fewer tourists around now. There is no line to get into the palace of Knossos and even the ferry to Santorini is half-empty. The intense heat is gone,...
Now that a week has passed since Sen. John Sidney McCain III was given a truly presidential sendoff in Washington, it is not in poor form to try and amend the gushing record presented by the media and the bipartisan establishment. The plaudits and perorations are well known, including Meghan McCain’s amazing claim that America’s...
President Donald Trump’s meeting with President Vladimir Putin of Russia and their joint press conference in Helsinki on July 16 have ignited an ongoing paroxysm of rage and hysteria in the U.S. media. Morbid Russophobia and Putin-hate are déjà-vu, but the outpouring of vitriol against Trump has been raised to an entirely new level. The...
President Donald Trump announced late on Wednesday that he had asked Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to study South African land and farm seizures and killing of farm owners, by implication of white race. The African National Congress (ANC)-controlled government in Pretoria accused the President of stoking racial divisions in the country, while his haters...
The United States has created “chaos” in its management of foreign affairs, Turkey’s foreign minister Mevlüt Çavusoglu said on August 13. “There is confusion in the U.S. administration, and no one knows who is doing what,” Çavusoglu said after meeting his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov in Ankara. “We are at a turning point in the...
On August 7 President Donald Trump issued a strong warning to countries trading with Iran, following his re-imposition of sanctions on the country. “Anyone doing business with Iran will NOT be doing business with the United States,” he tweeted. Some reimposed sanctions took effect overnight, while additional, more punitive ones—relating to oil exports and central...
A successful national leader (“good” or “bad”) is able to redefine the terms of what is politically possible in accordance with his values, and to produce durable desired outcomes. Lincoln, FDR, and Reagan come to mind at home, and Churchill, De Gaulle, and Deng Xiaoping abroad. Very few are able to effect a profound, long-lasting...