Peter Van Buren

January 26, 2016

…that works out to about 28 dead every day. It is also an estimate, given that many areas of the country are not readily accessible, and because the death toll from the siege of Ramadi is not accounted for in the figures. More than 3.2 million Iraqis are internally displaced and/or homeless. Iraq is now […]

Daniel McAdams

January 25, 2016

The US Senate under Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is poised to rush to the floor a bill that would give the president total war authority anywhere on the globe, perhaps even including on US soil. All in the name of fighting ISIS, Congress is about to crown the president with unlimited war powers. In […]

Daniel McAdams

January 25, 2016

Most normal people look at the smoldering cemetery that is post-“liberation” Libya, the gruesome graveyard of an almost-“liberated” Syria, the 14 year slow-motion failed regime change in Afghanistan, blood-drenched Iraq, and they are horrified. Washington Post’s neocon nag Jennifer Rubin looks across that bloody landscape and sees a beautiful work in progress. She writes today […]

Jeremy Bunch

January 23, 2016

The long red carpet is being rolled out from Tehran, and we should all hope that what strolls out is copious amounts of pistachios, fancy rugs, and caviar. And oil… oh boy the oil! Yes, the big Iran Deal appears to have been pulled off, and like a man walking out into the sunlight after […]

Janet Weil

January 22, 2016

Saturday, January 17, marked 25 years – a full generation – since the 1991 launch of a U.S.-led mostly air war, “Operation Desert Storm,” that devastated Iraq, including extensive damage to Iraqi electrical, water and sewage infrastructure, with terrible public health consequences. A quarter-century later, the U.S. is still bombing, and 3400+ US troops are […]

Peter Van Buren

January 22, 2016

This one’s so funny that it must be some kind of U.S.-led initiative; I can’t believe the Afghans have this kind of a sense of humor. But whatever the origin, Afghanistan banned the sale of imitation Kalashnikovs and other toy guns after they caused injuries to more than 100 people during the last Eid celebrations. […]

Peter Van Buren

January 21, 2016

In an Op-Ed printed in the Washington Post, former General David Petraeus says it is time to “unleash our airpower in support of our Afghan partners in the same way that we support our Iraqi and Syrian partners against extremists.” Petraeus went on to claim: At present, U.S. and NATO airpower in Afghanistan is used […]

Daniel McAdams

January 21, 2016

A Saudi-backed opposition committee representing the rebels fighting to overthrow the Assad government in Syria have agreed on a chief negotiator for peace talks scheduled to begin in Geneva next week. The rebels will be represented by Mohammed Alloush, political leader of Jaysh al-Islam. Mohammed Alloush’s brother, Zahran, led Jaysh al-Islam until he was killed […]

Ramzy Baroud

January 20, 2016

When ISIS militias swept into Mosel, Iraq, in June 2014, Ibrahim Mahmoud plotted his flight, along with his whole family, which included 11 children. Once upon a time, Ibrahim was himself a child escaping another violent campaign carried out by equally angry militias. In his lifetime, Ibrahim became a refugee twice, once when he was […]

Daniel McAdams

January 19, 2016

Free trade — not corporatist, managed trade — is the best guarantor of peace and prosperity. Protectionism leads to trade wars which very often lead to hot wars. In the US presidential race the issue of tariffs and other taxes on trade have begun to enter the conversation. We should remember how dangerous this kind […]