U.S. Foreign Policy Archive

The results of Pakistan’s parliamentary elections provide a genuine opportunity for Pakistan and the United States to rebalance their relationship. For Pakistan, they are a chance to re-establish representative government. For the United States, they are a chance to demonstrate support for Pakistan’s democratic institutions. And for both countries, they are an opportunity to initiate a much healthier long-term relationship. Despite his recent appeals to European and American audiences for support, the Musharraf era is over. President Pervez Musharraf once could claim to rule Pakistan with the support of the public, the Army and the Americans, but not anymore. His […]

Last week, the U.S.-led Multi-National Force-Iraq (MNF-I) had nothing but praise for Shiite theocrat-wannabe Moqtada al-Sadr. Prefacing his name with “al-Sayyid” (the Honorable), the United States acknowledged al-Sadr’s legitimacy in the Iraqi political scene as U.S. commanders warmly embraced his decision to maintain a ceasefire between his roughly 60,000-strong illegal militia (Jaish al-Mahdi or JAM) and Iraqi government and coalition forces. With a tenuous domestic political situation in Iraq, the United States had no choice but to shake hands with the devil. Without question, the short-term effects of the U.S. surge strategy have been highly positive: significant reductions of violence […]

DENPASAR, Indonesia — When the U.S. ambassador to the Philippines, Kristie Kenney, visited the camp of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) on Feb. 19, she made modern history. In fact, the last time the highest American official stationed in the country talked directly with the Moros was in the early 20th century, during the American colonial period in the Philippines. Moro is the term used to define the native Muslims and tribal people who reside in Mindanao and the Sulu Archipelago. The MILF is the Philippines’ largest Islamic rebel group and the one spearheading the decades long fight for […]

DRUG TRAFFIC — On Feb. 5, Director of National Intelligence J. Michael McConnell told the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence that “Venezuela has been a major departure point” for Colombian cocaine since 2005, and Venezuela’s “importance as a transshipment center continues to grow.” On March 1, the State Department is expected to address the same issue in its annual International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, one of those report cards about other people’s faults that State grinds out every year — this one, of course, about the anti-drug war worldwide. Three years ago, the Venezuelan government halted regular cooperation with the […]

With Pakistan’s much-anticipated Feb. 18 elections fast approaching against the backdrop of mounting jihadist activity in the country’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), questions about the stability of the region and the strategic implications of the activity there for U.S. interests seem to be growing more urgent by the day. While Pakistan has been considered a “key ally” in the war on terror for many years now, receiving at least $10 billion since 9/11 for its support in hunting down top al-Qaida operatives, this partnership has become dramatically more complex of late, and American decision makers are now facing difficult […]

WASHINGTON – Despite little evidence that a massive program of aerial coca crop fumigation has worked in Colombia, and despite serious reservations by the Pentagon and by Afghan president Hamid Karzai, the U.S. State Department, backed by the White House, is quietly pushing the expansion of aerial poppy eradication into Afghanistan as a way to fight the Taliban. Soon Afghanistan, which produces 92 percent of the world’s opium and 80 percent of the world’s heroin, may be the target of a program of Plan Colombia-style aerial crop eradication. With the Afghan war entering a tenuous new phase, the stakes are […]

This week’s must-read piece on U.S. foreign policy is Jonathan Rauch’s “Export Security, Not Democracy” (link will expire Feb. 8) in the Feb. 1 issue of National Journal. Rauch takes a cue from Amitai Etzioni’s book “Security First” (he also cites Larry Diamond’s latest), in arguing that “basic security,” not democracy, should be at the center of U.S. foreign policy. Not only does basic security rest “on the deepest and most universal of moral foundations, respect for human life and repudiation of deadly violence,” but it also addresses a tragic irony of current U.S. foreign policy: that American-style democracy offends […]