Washington’s Gunboat Diplomacy

Washington’s Gunboat Diplomacy

Great powers throughout history often become lazy. This translates into opting for easy solutions by force majeure to problems that might better be dealt with more constructively, a process once referred to as “gunboat diplomacy.” The United States has fallen into that trap, operating under the assumption that military power is ultimately the only thing that matters….

Trump’s Criticism of NATO Ignores the Real Questions

Trump’s Criticism of NATO Ignores the Real Questions

The usual NATO summit begins and ends with U.S. and European leaders issuing platitudes about the unbreakable bonds between Western democracies. The two-day summit that began Wednesday is not the usual NATO summit. President Donald Trump came to Brussels armed with a barrage of insults and Twitter blasts against his ostensible allies. He gave a public tongue-lashing…

Trump’s Using Russian Gas Rhetoric to Control Germany and Support Poland

Trump’s Using Russian Gas Rhetoric to Control Germany and Support Poland

Read between the President’s words and this “stable genius” is at it again with one of his Machiavellian plans. German-Polish Rivalry Trump raised eyebrows this morning when he told NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg during breakfast that “Germany is captive of Russia because it is getting so much of its energy from Russia. They pay…

America First, Helsinki, and Trump’s Existential Threat to the Empire

America First, Helsinki, and Trump’s Existential Threat to the Empire

The major – perhaps only – redeeming virtue of the Donald’s ersatz campaign platform was his clear intent to seek a rapprochement with Russia, revamp America’s commitments to NATO and other cold war relics and to discard “Regime Change” as the core tenant of foreign policy. In essence, “America First” was to become the new…