Can Stan McChrystal’s Campaign Be Saved?
The nail-biting saga of General Stanley McChrystal’s Rolling Stone interview has riveted a wide audience whose interest in Afghanistan had otherwise flagged. Shortly we’ll know whether he keeps his...
View ArticleTeam America’s New Boss
The McChrystal story really spiced up the week, and brought the Afghan war into a really clear focus. Matthew Yglesias wrote a fantastic short essay at The Daily Beast about what General David Petraeus...
View ArticleHow We Fight
Fred Kaplan’s Insurgents on David Petraeus The American occupation of Iraq in its early years was a swamp of incompetence and self-delusion. The tales of hubris and reality-denial have already passed...
View ArticleArrested Development: The Pentagon Going Forward
The Pentagon finally learned to embrace new ideas. Can its short-lived revolution in thinking survive the coming period of austerity and retrenchment? [Originally posted on The Blog of the Century.]...
View ArticleKaplan and COIN: The Tweets
Fred Kaplan graciously took part in a Twitter conversation about his book, The Insurgents. He explained his concerns that the military remains confused about its mission, and expounded on his view that...
View ArticleCambanis vs. Cohen on Bloggingheads
My first foray onto Bloggingheads TV, with fellow TCF fellow Michael Cohen. Michael thinks COIN is “claptrap”; I think it was a decent idea taken too far. We’re both starting our discussion with a read...
View ArticlePutin’s crushing strategy in Syria
Illustration: RICHARD MIA FOR THE BOSTON GLOBE [Published in The Boston Globe Ideas.] LATAKIA, SYRIA WHEN RUSSIAN JETS started bombing Syrian insurgents, it was no surprise that fans of President...
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