American Politics and the World… Post #118: Cowgirl Diplomacy? Foreign Policy Under Hillary Clinton 24 May 201627 Feb 2017 America’s mainstream media, ever attracted to the splashy rather than the serious, has a new topic to occupy the time until Election Day: President Trump. What will he do first? …
BLOG… Post #117: Evaluating Obama’s Foreign Policy Record 15 May 201627 Feb 2017 So you’re not excited by Donald Trump’s announcement of his first foreign-policy acts as president: building the Mexico Wall, the No-Muslims Wall, the End-of-NATO Wall, and the China Trade Wall. …
American Politics and the World… Post #110: Trump and China 15 Mar 201627 Feb 2017 Donald Trump says he “knows” China. He “likes” China, in fact “loves” China. And so long as the Chinese do exactly as he wants, he’ll continue loving China. And that’s…
BLOG… Post #107 – Is US-Russia Engagement Still Possible? 11 Feb 201627 Feb 2017 President Obama’s failed attempt to “reset” US-Russia relations raises the question whether or not engaging Russia in the fullest sense is still possible. I think not, at least for the…
BLOG… Post #106: Deadlock: North Korea’s Nuclear Test and US Policy 2 Feb 201627 Feb 2017 North Korea continues to rattle the cages of both friend and foe. Despite near-universal condemnation of its fourth nuclear test and a deplorable human rights record, Kim Jong-un defiantly disregards…
BLOG… Post #100: China in Paris 7 Dec 201527 Feb 2017 Xi Jinping is a lucky man: He got to spend a few days in Paris, at the UN Conference on Climate Change, while his fellow Beijingers suffered under some of…
BLOG… Post #98: Reality Check on China 13 Nov 201527 Feb 2017 Will the real China please stand up? In the US media, most stories about China raise questions that amount to threat-mongering. How can China’s “aggressiveness” in the South China Sea…
BLOG… Post #80: The Looming US-China Crisis in the South China Sea 10 Jun 201527 Feb 2017 The long-running, multi-party dispute over control of islets in the South China Sea (SCS) is worsening both in rhetoric and provocative activity. (For background, see my posts #23 and 41.)…
American Politics and the World… Post #79: The Pentagon Slush Fund 1 Jun 201527 Feb 2017 Back in 1959, President Eisenhower and Soviet Premier Khrushchev took a break from their summit and walked in the woods around Camp David. Khrushchev, in his memoirs, relates a conversation…
American Politics and the World… Post #76 – TPP: A Deeply Flawed Partnership 4 May 201527 Feb 2017 (Note: A longer version of this post was subsequently published at http://japanfocus.org/-Mel-Gurtov/4318/article.html.) The American people have become used to government trickery in foreign affairs—wars and interventions based on lies and…
BLOG… Post #41 – The US-China Tangle Over the South China Sea 21 Aug 201427 Feb 2017 The best way to describe the latest round of U.S.-China dispute over the South China Sea (SCS) is “déjà vu all over again.” (See post #23 for background.) The setting…