Subterms
Despite knowledge of his illness, I was stunned and saddened by the death on January 10 of Sultan Qaboos bin Said of Oman. I had come to know Sultan Qaboos, who ruled Oman for 49 years, as an American diplomat. I served two assignments in Oman, as deputy chief of mission between 1998 and 2001, […] More
At his speech on January 8 following the Iranian missile attack on Iraqi bases hosting American forces, US President Donald Trump announced, with his usual tone of self-congratulation, that “Iran appears to be standing down, which is a good thing for all parties concerned and a very good thing for the world.” The rest of […] More
Following Iran’s missile attacks on a two US airbase, one outside Baghdad and the second near Erbil in Iraqi Kurdistan, US President Donald Trump almost triumphantly announced that Iran is now standing down in their the two countries’ intensified conflict following the killing of Quds Force commander, General Qassem Soleimani, in an American drone attack […] More
A large number of people seem to believe that World War III has begun with the drone strike that killed Iran’s Quds Force commander, General Qassem Soleimani, on January 3. On December 27, a US military contractor was killed in a rocket attack in Iraq, and the US responded with a bombing campaign. Iraqis rioted and […] More
As vice president to Barack Obama, whose proudest claim to honor and presidential stature was the assassination of Osama bin Laden in 2011, Joe Biden understands what it means — at least in terms of political marketing — to fulfill the requirements of justice. Commenting on the US drone strike on January 3 that killed […] More
The assassination of the commander of Iran’s Quds Force, Major General Qassem Soleimani, by the United States on January 3, along with his right-hand man in Iraq, Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, was a surprising move for many. Soleimani’s assassination increased pressure on President Donald Trump in Washington and has already intensified concerns about a new war […] More
When people live (and die) with a binary vision of the world, the same object may end up with two opposite meanings. This tends to be the norm in wartime, but the trend toward reducing everything to a binary opposition has increased radically in recent years, even in times of peace. The instinct to label […] More
In the days since the January 3 assassination of Major General Qassem Suleimani, commander of Iran’s Quds Force, on the orders of US President Donald Trump, the world has anxiously waited to see whether, where and how Tehran would fulfill its pledge to wreak vengeance on the Americans. Thus far, Iran’s strategic response has been […] More
