The Islamic Republic of Iran often is in the news, and usually for all the wrong reasons. Tehran is suspected of developing nuclear weapons, though U.S. intelligence agencies see no evidence of an active nuclear weapons program. Iran also has a deteriorating human rights record.

The Islamic state is a...

The Syrian civil war lurches on, adding new casualties every day. The campaign to push the U.S. into the Syrian civil war also marches on, threatening to add American casualties to the human toll. Possible use of chemical weapons by the Syrian government is another reason to stay out, not...

Secretary of State John Kerry made a surprise visit to Baghdad to ask the Iraqi government to stop helping Iran support Syria's Bashar al-Assad. Kerry received an embarrassing rebuff--so much for the Bush administration's celebrated victory over Saddam Hussein.

This time ten years ago the grand Iraqi cakewalk had begun....

Over the last decade the Republican Party put militarism before limited government. The Bush administration foolishly invaded Iraq. Presidential candidates John McCain and Mitt Romney sounded even more extreme. GOP politicians denounced the coming budget sequester for reducing military as well as domestic outlays.

However, conservative Republicans are beginning to...

War is hell, said Union Gen. William Sherman. The most obvious casualties are the formal combatants, those seeking to kill each other on the battlefield. But others also are at risk, especially in today's unconventional wars.

In Iraq and Afghanistan the U.S. relied heavily on interpreters, most recruited from the...

Politics is blood sport, and so it is with the nomination of Chuck Hagel to be Secretary of Defense. Washington's bipartisan War Party is horrified that a warrior who despises war might end up running the Pentagon.

For more than a decade the nation's capital has been overrun by the...

KUWAIT CITY, KUWAIT -- Kuwait is a shrimp among whales, to borrow an image usually applied to Korea. Little more than a postage stamp in the Persian Gulf, Kuwait was long overseen, or "protected," by Great Britain, before becoming independent in 1961. It offers a liberal model for other Gulf...

Chuck Hagel is the Neoconservatives' worst nightmare. A decorated combat veteran who disdains promiscuous war-making. A conservative Republican who rejects a foreign policy of wandering the globe bombing, invading, and occupying other nations. A supporter of Israel who won't subcontract his judgment to the demands of Israel's Likud Party.

No...

The most important vote on November 6 was not reelecting Barack Obama as president. It was legalizing marijuana in Colorado and Washington. Drug prohibition is the latest addition to the endangered species list. The fight over drug policy will go on for a long time. But the Drug War is...

To listen to some of my friends, the world is about to end. With the reelection of Barack Obama the Communization (or was that Islamization?) of America now is inevitable.

I'm not thrilled with President Obama's victory. I am a classical, not a modern, liberal. That means I believe in...

The Republican Party claims to believe in freedom. But not really. Certainly not if that means being able to vote for someone who truly believes in liberty.

Former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson, a Republican who cut spending while advocating legalization of marijuana, originally ran for the GOP presidential nomination....

The world today is an ugly place. Buying dictators doesn't yield the geopolitical payoff it once did, but liberating countries doesn't generate the gratitude Americans expect. One nation moving in a positive direction is Burma, or Myanmar.

Nobel Peace Prize laureate and long-time opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi...

The 2012 presidential campaign is speeding toward its climax. With the Obama and Romney campaigns blasting away at each other, U.S.-China relations may become collateral damage. Life appears to be imitating art: Christopher Buckley's latest novel involves a political plot by a defense contractor to inflate bilateral tensions for profit....

Yesterday, Republican Presidential hopeful Mitt Romney delivered a major foreign policy speech charging President Barack Obama with a weak and bumbling record. Although Romney emphasized his differences with his opponent on global security challenges, his criticisms highlighted the contradictions within his own foreign policy platform.

Romney

The Drug War is over. The U.S. government hasn't stopped arresting people for using pot and other illicit substances. But no one seriously believes Washington is going to "win," whatever that means. The Drug War is on autopilot, with American politicians afraid to admit the obvious.

However, foreign...

The November election is looking to be another dreary choice between the lesser of two evils. Do you want the big spending interventionist or the big spending interventionist? One probably would spend a bit more money while the other one probably would start a few more wars.

America is a land of liberty and opportunity, and has admirably served as "a city upon a hill" in the words of Puritan John Winthrop, who led the Massachusetts Bay Colony in the New World. The U.S. continues to attract freedom-seekers from around the world.

Yet America's greatness has come...

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his family have turned his government into an essentially criminal enterprise. For more than a year Syrians have been attempting to overthrow the system.

By some estimates 7500 people have died. Defections from the military have led to creation of a small "Free Syrian...

Leave it to radio personality Rush Limbaugh to turn a serious policy issue into a personal attack. But the moral character of Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke doesn't matter (except, presumably, to her). What should worry the rest of us is her apparent belief that we all are obligated to...

The U.S. has been fighting the "war on terrorism" for more than a decade. Thousands of Americans have died, both in the 9/11 attacks and Washington's wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. The Constitution also is under assault, as successive presidents have asserted extraordinary and unreviewable power in the name of...