There are few ways for the West to deter the rise of another dictator like Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Mikhail Klimentyev/Sputnik/AFP via Getty Images
In recent years, Western governments have, in effect, aided the rise of personalist dictators in Russia, Iraq, Libya, North Korea and Venezuela.
Supporters of Ukraine, like these demonstrators in Boston on Feb. 27, 2022, are likely to be disappointed by any peace deal.
Vincent Ricci/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images
Jeffrey Fields, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
The US frequently chooses to put its own interest ahead of its professed values. That approach to foreign policy is called ‘realpolitik’ and it may lead to an unsatisfying peace deal in Ukraine.
A Ukrainian police officer is overwhelmed by emotion after comforting people evacuated from Irpin on the outskirts of Kyiv on March 26, 2022. History shows that wars launched for nebulous reasons generally backfire on those who launch them.
(AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda)
It’s difficult for regimes to galvanize public opinion or maintain people’s willingness to accept the sacrifices associated with a war waged for questionable reasons.
Tens of thousands of members of Iraq’s Yazidi religious minority are now living in shelters and camps.
AP Photo/Seivan Salim
Interviews with former torturers in Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq reveal what it takes to be a torturer – which could help explain how to reduce the number of people who get tortured around the world.
On Aug. 16, 2021, thousands of Afghans trapped by the sudden Taliban takeover rushed the Kabul airport tarmac.
AP Photo/Shekib Rahmani
Gordon Adams, American University School of International Service
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that the US Afghanistan pullout is not a repeat of failures in other recent wars. “This is not Saigon,” he said. A seasoned foreign policy expert disagrees.
The 1991 Gulf War was seen as the start of an age of peace, but paved the way for much future conflict.
Shiite Muslims attend a mourning ritual during the Islamic month of Muharram, in the central shrine city of Karbala.
Photo by Mohammed SAWAF / AFP) (Photo by MOHAMMED SAWAF/AFP via Getty Images
Millions of Muslims travel to Karbala in Iraq for one of the largest annual pilgrimages. The pilgrimage has adapted and changed over its centuries-old history.
U.S. special operations troops are a crucial element of the fight against terrorism.
AP Photo/Wally Santana
Sending specially trained operatives into hostile territories dates back to Colonial days. In the past decade, special operations forces have become central to America’s counterterrorism efforts.
Jeffrey Fields, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
Some of the major events in US-Iran relations highlight the differences between the nations’ views, but others presented real opportunities for reconciliation.
Saddam Hussein: on trial in 2006 in Baghdad.
Nikola Solic/EPA
A memorial procession for Sgt. James Johnston, who was killed in Afghanistan in June, passes through Trumansburg, N.Y., Saturday, Aug. 31, 2019.
AP/David Goldman
Gordon Adams, American University School of International Service
US officials have consistently lied over decades about progress in the Afghanistan war. The lies are no surprise, writes a foreign affairs scholar – but they have profound consequences.
A mass grave is excavated in Khan Al-Rubea in 2003 that witnesses say is filled with the remains of Shia whom Saddam executed in 1991.
AP/Hasan Sarbakhshian
Distrust of the US – even if misplaced – can linger for decades, thwarting Washington’s foreign policy goals. A former US diplomat in Iraq reflects on that country’s skepticism of US aid efforts.
The National Intelligence Council works inside government but is little understood outside. Yet it has helped respond to almost all the major foreign policy challenges of the last 40 years.
Family members of Sunni men and boys in Iraq accused of supporting ISIS hold up pictures of their arrested relatives.
AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo
Iraq beat the Islamic State. Now, its Shia government is jailing and even executing all suspected terrorists – most of them Sunni Muslims. The clampdown may inflame a centuries-old sectarian divide.
Garbage piled up in the opposition-held city of Afrin, Syria, in March 2018.
AP/Lefteris Pitarakis
Keeping the water and power on, managing sewers and collecting garbage will help communities shattered by the Syrian civil war rebuild – and keep out the Islamic State, says a former aid official.
Unlike every president who followed him, George H.W. Bush had a background in foreign policy. In 1972, Bush was serving as U.S. ambassador to the U.N.
AP Photo/Dave Pickoff
James Goldgeier, American University School of International Service
The first President Bush had some impressive foreign policies wins, but could he be best remembered for getting the US entangled in Iraq?
Robert Mahoney of the Committee to Protect Journalists on Oct. 18 appealed to the U.N. to investigate the disappearance of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton
The Trump administration’s abandonment of support for democracy and civil rights abroad may be behind the sort of attacks on individual freedom that likely claimed journalist Jamal Khashoggi’s life.
Professor at the School of International Service and Visiting Senior Fellow, Council on Foreign Relations, American University School of International Service
Professeure en relations internationales / Schiller International University (SIU) et Institut libre d'étude des relations internationales (ILERI), Institut libre d'étude des relations internationales (ILERI)