Oil prices started to surge even before upheaval in the Middle East had spread to oil producing states. Now the specter of civil war in Libya is intensifying fears of spiraling prices, shortages, pipeline stoppages and, above all, of contagion.

This stark reminder of the impact of oil on...

Did President Obama set the bar too high? Last April he embraced the goal of a nuclear free world. At the time, he was widely applauded for bringing the United States back to nuclear disarmament after years of neglect by his predecessor, but will he now be jeered and criticized...

Vice President Biden broke the ice with Russia at the Munich Security Conference. It is time, he said, "to revisit the many areas where we can and should be working together" and it seems that Secretary of State Clinton will soon follow up by meeting her Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov...