In The News

Pakistan, Obsessed Over India, Risks Anarchy

Husain Haqqani August 21, 2014
Hope was brief for easing a long troubled relationship after Pakistan’s Nawaz Sharif traveled for the May inauguration of Narendra Modi as India’s prime minister. Sharif, who won in a 2013 landslide victory, now confronts protests from the opposition as the Pakistan military and agitators thrive on the notion of India as a permanent enemy, with many even condoning terrorist activities directed at...

PM's Pakistan Outreach Ends in Predictable Whimper

Siddharth Varadarajan August 19, 2014
Political extremists and opposition parties vilify Indian or Pakistani leaders who try for improved ties with between the two countries. India’s prime minister cancelled a meeting between the two foreign secretaries after a Pakistan High Commissioner met with the All Parties Hurriyat Conference on pursuing self-determination for Kashmir, an area of bitter dispute between India and Pakistan....

How America’s Police Became an Army: The 1033 Program

Taylor Wofford August 15, 2014
The US devotes 23 percent of its budget to defense purposes and veterans benefits – more than the next 13 countries combined. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan cost $4 trillion alone. Even before the country pulled back from wars, the Department of Defense has distributed surplus equipment to willing takers, including allies and local police at home, many untrained: The weapons can fall into...

The World Cannot Afford a Cold War

Nayan Chanda August 4, 2014
Europe and the United States regard Russia as a pariah since the downing of a Malaysian passenger airliner and support of insurgents in eastern Ukraine. A new Cold War could be in the making: “Far from the ideological struggle between two nuclear-armed rivals of the last century, it would represent a battle of political will between a democratic alliance of 28 European countries and the US on one...

Dempsey: US Military Dusting Off Decades-Old “Readiness” Plans for Russia

Lee Ferran July 25, 2014
Tensions are running high between the United States and Russia over the latter’s intervention in Ukraine, lending support to a separatist movement that likely destroyed a passenger jet. Europe is not joining the United States in sanctions on Russia, and Russia is trying to build a solid wall resisting European and NATO influence around its borders and even former Soviet satellite states. But...

Global Casualty of an Escalating Local War

David R. Cameron July 24, 2014
Malaysian Flight 17 was presumably mistaken for a military plane and shot down by a surface-to-air missile over eastern Ukraine, near the Russian border. The blatant disrespect for the dead – images of pro-Russian separatists picking through the wreckage and passenger belongings, drunkenly and belligerently barring international investigators from the scene – have shocked the world. Tragically, “...

Crises Cascade and Converge, Testing Obama

Peter Baker July 23, 2014
The world suddenly teems with crises and many expect the US President Barack Obama to intervene, swiftly ending civil wars and conflict raging in eastern Ukraine, Syria, Israel-Palestine and Afghanistan – as well as poverty that is driving Central American children to the United States. Many in the United States criticize the president’s handling of foreign policy, but likewise embrace the reason...