Articles

Trump’s Troubling Retreat

January 23, 2017 Lawrence J. Haas U.S. News & World Report

At this historical turning point, with the free world hungry for renewed American leadership, President Donald Trump's foreboding inaugural address was as troubling for what it didn't say as what it did. It was the mirror image of John Kennedy's stirring address of 1961, which focused almost entirely on America's struggle to defend freedom around the world and mentioned domestic policy only in passing. More than half a century later, with America's global leadership just as vital and far more widely doubted, Trump focused overwhelmingly on domestic affairs, citing foreign policy only in passing.

Peril In Peru: Islamist Terror Shifts South

January 18, 2017 Ilan I. Berman Foreign Affairs

It might just be the most important terrorism case you've never heard of. Last fall, prosecutors in the Peruvian capital of Lima launched formal legal proceedings against a 30-year-old alleged Hezbollah operative named Mohammed Hamdar. The trial, now underway, has major regional - indeed, global - implications for the fight against international terrorism.

Move The Embassy

January 9, 2017 Lawrence J. Haas U.S. News & World Report

President-elect Donald Trump's promise to move the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem provides a timely opportunity for the new president to make a sharp break with President Barack Obama's unwise, unjustified and ultimately ineffective hostility toward America's closest ally in the turbulent Middle East.

China’s New Silk Road Is Getting Muddy

January 8, 2017 Joshua Eisenman Foreign Policy

With the future of U.S.-China relations an open question for the incoming Donald Trump administration, many have focused on whether the president-elect's promise to withdraw from negotiations over the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) will enhance Beijing's growing influence in East Asia. But rather than hand-wringing over TPP's ignominious failure, Asia watchers should turn their attention to China's unprecedented $1 trillion strategic gambit: the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road, aka "One Belt, One Road" (OBOR). Launched in 2013 as President Xi Jinping's signature initiative, OBOR holds great promise, as well as potential pitfalls, for both China and its neighbors.

Trump’s Arsenal Against Iran

December 28, 2016 Ilan I. Berman USA Today

What will the new president do about Iran?

While still on the campaign trail, President-elect Donald Trump railed repeatedly against President Obama's "disastrous" nuclear deal with Iran. He pledged to tear up the agreement, or at least amend it substantially, as one of his first acts in office. Yet, for a host of reasons, the nuclear pact concluded between the Iran and the P5+1 powers (the U.S., U.K., Russia, China, France and Germany) last summer is likely to prove more resilient than either the president-elect or his advisers hope.