Cover Story
Alan Dupont
Hillary Clinton’s proclamation that the “United States is back in Asia” begs the question of whether the US could be said to have ever really left. Since its comprehensive defeat of Japan in the 20th century’s second great war, the US has maintained a substantial, unbroken strategic presence in Asia, fought...
Blogbook
If logic mattered in these debates...
James Fallows
...Rick Santorum would have been declared the knockout winner over Mitt Romney tonight.
American Talk
Tom Switzer talks to Nicholas Burns, Professor of the Practice of Diplomacy and International Politics at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government.
American Opinion
Jonathan Bradley
This past April, a momentous anniversary passed by entirely unremarked upon. The 16th day of that month heralded 10 years since the word ‘blog’ first appeared in the pages of The New York Times. The item, a short note in the Business Digest section of the paper, noted that “blog” was a synonym for...
Book Review
Peter Coleman
Karen Middleton has a good eye for what journalists call a fascinating detail—for that inessential touch which brings the story alive and lingers in the memory. Here, for example, is Australia 10 years ago in the tense days after 9/11. The Qantas 747, which was bringing prime minister John Howard back...
American Opinion
Barack Obama was once memorably described by a biographer as a shape-shifter, a political being whose racial background and peripatetic upbringing and education gave him unique skills to inspire and… more»
The 2012 presidential campaign has begun in the United States, at least for Republican Party hopefuls. Too often, the rhetoric reminds me of a bad time in the American farm… more»
Private Bradley Manning was arrested in May 2010 and charged with transferring classified data onto his personal computer and disclosing defence information to an unauthorised recipient—namely, Julian Assange of WikiLeaks… more»
Yoshihiko Noda, Japan’s new prime minister—the sixth in five years—has been handed a poisoned chalice. At 54, he inherits all of the problems that his predecessor Naoto Kan was grappling… more»
The boundaries between journalism, intelligence, diplomacy and think tank analysis are dissolving at a rapid rate, thanks to the unstoppable advance of social media. It is not entirely an original… more»
This past April, a momentous anniversary passed by entirely unremarked upon. The 16th day of that month heralded 10 years since the word ‘blog’ first appeared in the pages of… more»
Last June, the then US defence secretary and former head of the CIA under George W. Bush, Robert Gates, launched a rhetorical missile at America's NATO allies. In a speech… more»
In 1980 I attended a graduate seminar focussing on rival claims over the Spratly and Paracel islands in the South China Sea, and recall the professor suggesting that there was… more»
In an interview before a rapt crowd at the Aspen Ideas Festival this July, Bill Clinton wound up a high-toned discussion about global philanthropy with some political-pro handicapping of the… more»
The Arab world is in the grip of critical structural changes. The current popular revolts across the region mark an unprecedented awakening of the Arab people in modern history. The… more»
Foreign policy wonks in droves are turning to Twitter to make their ideas travel faster and further. In just a few years the technique has become so commonplace that established… more»
"Germany's nuclear energy blunder" read the headline in a lead Washington Post editorial. "Panicked overreaction isn't the right response to the partial meltdown," it went on to say. In the… more»
Think tanks strive to dominate that great grey battle space where both journalistic skirmishers and encumbered academics are at a disadvantage: packaging serious ideas for busy policymakers and opinion-shapers. Yet… more»
And then there were 18. The East Asian Summit (EAS) is an annual forum launched in 2005 at the initiative of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). It initially… more»
Deep disagreements over political issues, and over the perceptions of reality behind them, have been the norm rather than the exception through American life. This is the nation that had… more»
Is Egypt ready for self-government? Is Libya? As questions like these are asked in the wake of the Arab revolt of 2011, Americans would do well to recall how many… more»
There is historical resonance in the fact that the Battle of the Statehouses, the struggle over the attempt by newly-elected Republicans to kill off public service unions, broke out in… more»
This issue of American Review goes to press before the 2010 US mid-term elections and will appear after they are completed. That timing, potentially awkward, is in fact a valuable… more»
It is shaping up to be a busy autumn in Asia for the embattled Obama administration as it seeks to shore up its strategic interests in the world's most dynamic… more»
America's think tanks are looking east. Leading the way is the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, which earlier this year opened its doors in China, in partnership with Beijing's highly… more»
How on earth, my Australian friends have been asking me, can so large a fraction of the American public believe that the American president is an illegal Muslim immigrant actively… more»
China is the poorest member to enter the world's richest club. It is a contradiction that explains much about the country's own challenges, and its relationship with the United States.… more»
Najeeb Peykon shaves every morning. "I shave as a mark of resistance to the return of the Taliban," he said, beaming from a showbiz burgundy suit with a red tie.… more»
US combat troops left Iraq by the end of August, fulfilling President Obama's campaign promise to end the war. Operation Iraqi Freedom, intended to liberate Iraqis from Saddam Hussein's tyranny… more»
Of the 13 recessions that the American public has endured since the Great Depression of 1929–33, none has presented a more punishing combination of length, breadth and depth… more»
Concern about climate change has ebbed with the global economic contraction. Noble sacrifice seems less attractive to people fearing loss of a job. So the political resolve to address global… more»
The ongoing theme of this column will be the gap between the ideals of American foreign policy and the messy realities of American involvement in the world. That a gap… more»
America enjoys—or suffers—a surfeit of self-reflection about its place in the international order. It basically invented the foreign policy thinktank tradition, and still has a third of the world’s approximately… more»
Yukio Hatoyama, the relatively new prime minister of Japan, surely rues his choice to modify the 2006 bilateral agreement on downsizing the US military presence in Japan and relocation of… more»
A CBS/New York Times Poll taken in February reports the following responses to the question “What do you think is the most important problem facing this country today?”… more»
Universities in the United States have enjoyed global dominance for more than half a century thanks to their focus on research. In that time, they have produced 50… more»
In 1886, the African American abolitionist and spokesman Frederick Douglass published “The Future of the Coloured Race,” an essay which held that the biological assimilation of black Americans… more»
Economic news dominated headlines in late 2008. The United States government had taken over the ailing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which together owned or guaranteed more than half the… more»
Cover Story
America in Asia (Issue 6, 2011)
Something remarkable happened in Washington in October. After three years of recession and inaction on free trade, amid America’s vituperative partisan gridlock, and with rising fears of a double dip recession, a battered and beleaguered Barack Obama managed to convince Congress to pass free trade agreements with Colombia, Panama and… more»
So I don’t think there is any doubt, if there were when this administration began, that the United States is back in Asia. But I want to underscore that we are back to stay.… more»
What seemed impossible five years ago is a reality today; China has risen more rapidly and in different ways than most had anticipated. This has profoundly affected the region, the West and the concept of the West. China has chosen its own path; it will not become a member of… more»
The Obama Administration might have returned the United States to East Asia, but it was George W. Bush who brought America back into South Asia at the turn of the millennium. When he came to power in January 2001, Bush was determined to deal with the rise of China and… more»
The Day That Changed America (eBook Special)
It is never easy to judge the significance of any major event, especially one as momentous as September 11. Looking back, it is perhaps surprising that we were quite as shocked as we were. After all, there had been at least one serious attack on the United States itself in… more»
Terrorism isn’t a 20th-century phenomenon, but the circumstances of September 11—the way al Qaeda organised and funded itself and conducted its operations—could only have come out of the globalising world of the 1990s.… more»
From Lincoln’s Gettysburg address to FDR’s “righteous might” response to Pearl Harbour, wartime speeches by presidents of the United States have been enduring snapshots of history. The most obvious candidates from the 9/11 decade would be George W. Bush’s address to Congress on 20 September 2001 saying “our war on… more»
The Legacy of Terror (Issue 5, 2011)
The terrorist attacks of September 11 on New York and Washington led to a remarkably unanimous response, not just from the West but from the entire international community. For the only time in its history, NATO invoked the principle of collective defence enshrined in Article 5 of its founding treaty.… more»
A year after atomic bombs flattened Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Albert Einstein said: "The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our modes of thinking and we thus drift toward unparalleled catastrophe." This was much quoted after September 11, 2001. Although it has been 10 years since that tragic… more»
Like most terrorist attacks launched by little-known underground groups, al Qaeda's September 11 attacks were an attempt to capitalise on wide-ranging social and political frustrations. Al Qaeda's goal was to paint itself as heroic, thereby attracting a broad following. Such endeavours can only be successful—to various degrees—where deep frustrations already… more»
The September 11 strikes continue to profoundly influence American foreign and national security policy choices.… more»
The 911 Decade (Issue 4, 2011)
The essays in this collection were written well before Osama bin Laden was killed by the US Navy SEALs in early May. His death marked the end of the September 11 decade, even though the 10th anniversary was still over four months away. Though the themes explored in this volume… more»
It is tempting to view the events of September 11, 2001, as having shattered the faith in historical progress that had been the secular faith of the West since the Enlightenment. Its late 20th-century iterations dominated the thinking of American policymakers across the political spectrum, and its intellectual underpinnings ranged… more»
As with the bombing of Pearl Harbour and the assassination of President Kennedy, all adult Americans know where they were on September 11, 2001. On that Tuesday morning I was five blocks from the White House at the 5th-floor offices of National Affairs in Washington, an office that housed both… more»
Foreign policy issues were notably absent in the 2000 American election campaign, but they came roaring back within a year. The crisis of September 11, 2001 shocked the country and produced an opportunity for George W. Bush to express a bold new vision of foreign policy. Effective visions combine feasibility… more»
The Road Ahead (Issue 3, 2010)
If anyone had been asked in 1994 to provide a two-year assessment of Bill Clinton's performance, even supporters would have had a difficult time mustering a strong case. Two years into what we now know was president Clinton's first term, a fair observer might have described him as inept, overreaching,… more»
Barack Obama seemed in 2007–2008 a figure who had all but miraculously appeared in the United States, promising to end what was, to a great many Americans, a hateful and shaming national period, that of the George W Bush administration, in which the Republican Party of Abraham Lincoln and Theodore… more»
If, as Winston Churchill declared on 1 October, 1939, Russia is "a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma", then the foreign policy of the Obama administration is an ambivalence wrapped in a mentality inside a perplexity. The latter is not as inclined to malignity as was the former… more»
In September 2008, the global economy and financial system experienced an earthquake, registering high on the economic Richter scale. The epicentre of this earthquake was the financial system in the United States. It was the end of the Bush presidency. The presidential elections were two months away. The timing from… more»
For the past 30 years, Americans have been experiencing an increasingly ugly political and social scene featuring a lot of anger and hate. There are ample reasons for Americans from all parts of the political spectrum to be angry, perhaps not least that during the first nine years of the… more»
Facing Up To China (Issue 2, 2010)
We all think we know how world history will play out over the next 50 years. China, bursting with nationalistic energy, will overtake the United States as the world’s largest economy and dominant superpower. The US, burdened by debt, stretched by imperial obligations and hamstrung by political infighting, will continue… more»
China is a rapidly rising power. Its confidence is up after a continuous decade of spectacular economic growth. During the eight years of the Bush administration, its economic output quadrupled. Today it is the world’s No. 2 trading country and the world’s No. 1 exporter. It possesses the largest foreign… more»
The contrast between the world’s two most important economies couldn’t be sharper—the ascendancy of China versus the potential decline of the United States. The possibility of such an about-face does not sit well in Washington, where China bashing is on the rise once again. But this time, unlike earlier years,… more»
We are entering a new era of world history marked by two distinct features. First, after 200 years, we will see the end of Western domination of world history (but not, of course, the end of the West). Second, we will see the return of Asia. From the year 1… more»
Half a century ago, on October 4, 1957, America was on the way out. On that day, the Soviet Union became the first space power in history, launching its Sputnik into orbit, and terror into the American soul. It “gave us a shock which hit many people as hard as… more»
The First Year (Issue 1, 2009)
American power is declining as Barack Obama begins his presidency. American power has been declining through the entirety of my conscious life.… more»
It is by now a cliché to observe that Barack Obama took office facing the greatest challenge of any United States president since Franklin Roosevelt. The US economy had been in free-fall since the northern summer of 2008, the nation’s image around the world had taken a beating over the… more»
In the first half of 2008, the United States headed into what seemed to be a normal business downturn triggered by a doubling of energy prices, although a few perspicacious analysts warned that something more fundamental was happening, at least in housing prices. They were correct: a bubble had pushed… more»
When Barack Obama was talking to about 200,000 Berliners during the United States presidential campaign in 2008, he said “that the problems of the world were too great to be solved by one nation alone”. Well, most of us always knew that. But Obama was recognising more than the United… more»
For more than a century, Pacific Asia has profoundly shaped the Australian-American relationship. By the mid-19th century, elites in both countries were defining themselves as Pacific nations, and the lands and societies of Pacific Asia provided important ingredients of the geopolitical identity of each. Asia was seen as a new… more»
The rise of China will be one of the great dramas of the 21st century. According to some observers we are witnessing the end of the American era and the gradual transition from a Western-oriented world order to one increasingly dominated by Asia. The historian Niall Ferguson argues that the… more»
In recent decades, every financial crisis that has had cross-border dimensions or implications has brought forth widespread calls reform of the international financial system. Such calls have often featured suggestions that it is time for a new Bretton Woods, referring to the United Statesled conference in New Hampshire in July… more»
For more than a decade, the modus operandi of United States-China relations has been pragmatic, interest based and disciplined. Both sides have focused squarely on economic win-wins, managing down their lurking geopolitical rivalries and keeping a lid on potentially incendiary political disagreements and military tensions. Presidents Hu Jintao and Barack… more»
Book Reviews
Spreading wealth is the key to continuing economic prosperity, so says this Nobel laureate more»
The inimitable Harold Bloom marries literary theory, critical prowess, and figurative eloquence in his self-described swansong more»
There are lessons for present-day policymakers in Eisenhower’s military restraint more»
Public opinion against Australia’s involvement in Afghanistan has reached a turning point
more»
America must decide if it is to compete with China or cede power to Asia. more»
John Curtin’s most famous quote redefined Australia. more»
Leading historian Niall Ferguson seriously overstates his case that the West has lost its nerve under deadly assault. more»
There goes the Lucky Country. more»
For those who crudely put all US right-wingers into one ideological pigeon hole, Hard Line is must reading. more»
Sometimes it's the leaders of democratic countries who find it hardest to be truthful with their people. more»
Corrupting a country's currency is the first step to destroying it. more»
George W. Bush never shied away from hard decisions in his battle to keep America safe. more»
In the land of free speech, tearing people apart on the airwaves is not confined to one side of politics. more»
Before he found fame and fortune, Christopher Hitchens was an ordinary boy from a lower middle-class English family. It was his love for words which took him far, all the way to America. more»
A White House insider’s take on the Iraq wars and realistic foreign policy. more»
The world owes the policymakers of 1989 a debt of gratitude–their decisions averted catastrophic conflict more»
A good deal of confusion has accompanied the rise, death and rebirth of conservatism in America. more»
Sarah Palin's autobiography is a scathing indictment of herself. more»
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