Amb. Marc Ginsberg

The White House is ever so reluctantly realizing that subcontracting out its Syria policy when the looming crisis demands mature, steady, imaginative, and alibi-avoiding strategies is doing more harm than good to everyone involved, except Mr. Assad. Administration officials keep gravitating to the simplistic assertion that when it comes to...

Say what you will about the outcome of tomorrow's Egyptian presidential election (and there will be a lot to be said), but the mere fact that tens of millions of Egyptians enjoyed the spectacle of a first-ever open presidential campaign and will not be beaten or bribed into voting for...

Admittedly, I am an unabashed Francophile and will miss Nicholas Sarkozy for purely selfish foreign policy reasons. Sarkozy has been a steadfast U.S. ally and reliable trans-Atlantic partner no matter his shortcomings at home.

So with the vote tally completed last evening in Paris, Francois Hollande will...

I lament the Obama administration's approach to the bloody slaughter in Syria. It has been deficient and often at cross purposes with our national security. An absence of imaginative, strategic diplomacy as the year-long crisis unfolded has caught the U.S. with dwindling options as the oxymoronic UN ceasefire collapses. Consequences...

Back in 1992, Serb forces besieged the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo after Bosnia declared its independence. In almost four years of urbicide, Washington uncomfortably stayed on the sidelines as Serbs inflicted unspeakable atrocities and hardship on Sarajevo. The well documented U.S. government's paralysis boxed in any hope for a new...

Want to buy a ticket to the Obama administration's semi-satirical Iran Nuclear Kabuki Theater show entitled "All Options are on the Table!"?

If ALL options are on the table (aka as a last resort the U.S. would use military force to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon) then...

"We do not want further militarization of the situation in Syria." So sheepishly declared an Obama Administration spokesman today when pressed why isn't the U.S. prepared to help defend defenseless Syrian protestors by providing humanitarian and perhaps financial and logistical support to the Free Syrian Army.

My how the...

It's high time to toss aside diplomatic niceties and place Russia in the diplomatic stockade, along with China and India for good measure (which are Russia's fellow UN Security Council offenders), in its conspiracy to shelter the illegitimate Bashar al-Assad from global wrath. Pure and simple, the Kremlin's ignoble efforts...

Syria's Assad stood before a well-bribed crowd a couple of days ago at Damascus University defiantly blaming a conspiracy of "outsiders," "terrorists," "the international news media," the Arab League, along with his favored rogues' gallery of other perceived demonic forces for fomenting the nine month uprising against his despotic regime....

You may be about to feel more pain at the pump courtesy of the atomic ayatollahs' latest gunboat diplomacy to counter the impact of the November 8 IAEA report revealing the extent of Iran's nuclear bomb making ambitions.

To guide you through the growing crisis, here is...

Three years into his presidency, what grades has Barack Obama earned managing foreign policy hotspots in 2011? Here is an end of year report card.

NATIONAL & HOMELAND SECURITY

Counter-terrorism: A+
No surprise here. With an admirably surgical counter-terrorism record and masterful resolve against global terrorist targets, the...

It took the best of international detective work against a determined master of the dark arts and subversion, but at long last the UN's intrepid nuclear inspectors caught Iran red-handed in the act of atomic bomb construction. In an unusually harsh, unprecedented November 18, 2011 assessment, the International...

Despite protestations of its purported political neutrality Egypt's besieged military leadership has been secretly funneling financial, food, and security support to Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood and its allied Salafist parties in the run up to next week's parliamentary elections.

The assistance takes the form of "walk around" money, clothing and...

Disptach from Cyprus: The beleaguered opponents of the Assad regime have dispatched an urgent "SOS" to the international community pleading for help to stop the slaughter in Syria's cities at the hands of Bashar al Assad's security forces. Elements of the opposition, including the Syrian National Council, have appealed for...

The Libyan people have paid a heavy price to bring about this day of euphoria since their uprising began in mid-February. Tens of thousands of Libyans are dead and wounded, or homeless. Most of Libya's cities abutting the Mediterranean between Tripoli and Benghazi have been destroyed. The country is awash...

When Attorney General Holder announced today that federal authorities had thwarted a "made for Hollywood" murder-for-hire plot by alleged Iranian-linked operatives tied to Mexico drug cartels to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the U.S, it came as no surprise to counter-terrorism experts familiar with Iran's terrorist activities in...

Harkening back to the grand old days of Sino-Soviet diplomatic chicanery, Moscow and Beijing yesterday jointly vetoed a watered-down United Nations Security Council resolution condemning Syria for its escalating brutality against democracy protestors. With the draft resolution in the diplomatic oven for months as violence throughout Syria escalated,...

GOP Presidential candidates Rick Perry and Mitt Romney have a lot to learn when it comes to Israel. The spectacle of Gov. Rick Perry lambasting President Obama in New York during the UN General Assembly surrounded by a posse of extremist members of the Israeli Knesset, speaks for...

Next week's unilateralist gambit by the Palestinian Authority to ram through a resolution on Palestinian statehood in the UN General Assembly will produce little more than the mirage of a fleeting diplomatic triumph.

No matter the hoopla surrounding it, the UN vote will certainly not represent a watershed moment...

On the tenth anniversary of 9/11 how does the Arab world view the United States? To paraphrase Ronald Reagan: is America's image better today in Arab world than it was 10 years ago? If so, to what affect? If not, why not?

If 9/11 represented a "clash of civilizations"...