Obama Was Not a Realist President
If he had been, he might have avoided some of his biggest foreign-policy mistakes.
View ArticleThe Realist Playbook Is Perfect, Except for One Thing. Reality.
Michael Mandelbaum’s latest tome of hardball IR theory is stuck in Westphalia. Realist or not, President Obama isn't buying it.
View ArticleDonald Trump Is a Magical (Foreign Policy) Realist
The Republican presidential nominee is a fan of military interventions — as long as they don’t cost anything.
View ArticleChoose Your Own Adventure: The Future of the World
It’s not just the U.S. presidential platforms that will shape global politics in the years ahead -- it’s Americans’ theories of how the world works.
View ArticleDon’t Knock Offshore Balancing Until You’ve Tried It
Whatever you want to call the Obama foreign policy, it has not been a calculated attempt to contain the rise of hegemonic threats.
View ArticleGreat Powers Are Defined by Their Great Wars
Even the most rational leaders are influenced by the power of collective memory.
View ArticleGrand Strategy Isn’t Grand Enough
The world’s best national security minds know to study every aspect of foreign policy. That’s not enough.
View ArticleHas Trump Become a Realist?
America finally has a president who grasps the basic logic of offshore balancing in the Middle East.
View ArticleThe World Wants You to Think Like a Realist
From Europe to Iran to North Korea, the world doesn't make sense anymore — unless you put all your illusions aside.
View ArticleEurope Isn’t Realistic. It’s Weak.
The EU has committed to outsourcing its dirty work to authoritarians in the Middle East and Africa—and to confusing dependence for maturity.
View ArticleWhen Zombie Neoconservatives Attack
Why most Americans are right about foreign policy, and David Brooks is wrong.
View ArticleBillionaires Can’t Buy World Peace
A new think tank funded by George Soros and Charles Koch wants to end American interventionism, but shows no understanding of what motivates it.
View ArticleThe Realists Are Wrong About Syria
Neither Trump nor the international relations experts who cheered his choice to withdraw U.S. troops have wrestled adequately with the costs of departure.
View ArticleWhy the Liberal International Order Will Endure Into the Next Decade
It’s true that democracy, globalism, and free trade are under assault, but they may prove stronger than the forces arrayed against them in the 2020s.
View ArticleThe Realist’s Guide to the Coronavirus Outbreak
Globalization is heading for the ICU, and other foreign-policy insights into the nature of the growing international crisis.
View ArticleWhy Is America So Bad at Promoting Democracy in Other Countries?
There’s no quick, cheap, or military-based way to bring peace to places like Afghanistan, Yemen, and Iraq. It’s time we changed our approach, and we can start at home.
View ArticleThe Real Reason U.S. Allies Are Upset About Afghanistan
The anger is real—but anguished humanitarianism is just part of it.
View ArticleThe AUKUS Dominoes Are Just Starting to Fall
The world’s newest security partnership is a window into how the world works—and the unpredictable places it’s heading.
View ArticleThe Realist Guide to World Peace
You don’t have to be an idealist to want to put an end to war.
View ArticleThe Con-Man Realism of Vivek Ramaswamy
The Republican presidential candidate’s foreign-policy platform is false advertising.
View ArticleHenry Kissinger, Colossus on the World Stage
The late statesman was a master of realpolitik—whom some regarded as a war criminal.
View ArticleKissinger’s Great Game
In his worldview, little countries only mattered to the extent that they played into struggles among the mighty.
View ArticleWas Henry Kissinger Really a Realist?
America’s most famous 20th century statesman wasn’t exactly what he claimed to be.
View ArticleA Practical Guide to Perpetual Peace
How to take realistic (and realist) steps toward a more utopian world order.
View ArticleWhy Realists Oppose the War in Gaza
If you’re surprised by the movement’s position, you never really understood it.
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