US Wars

After Costly Iraq, U.S. Military Efforts Change Focus

AP | ROBERT BURNS | Posted 12.23.2011

BALI, Indonesia — In the final days of the U.S. war in Iraq, the outlook for America's military entanglements is markedly different from the con...

Dumb Question of the 21st Century: Is It Legal?

Tom Engelhardt | Posted 07.31.2011

Tom Engelhardt

Is the Libyan war legal? Was bin Laden's killing legal? Were those "enhanced interrogation techniques" legal? These questions are irrelevant. In terms of "foreign policy," and "national security," the U.S. is now a post-legal society.

The Crash and Burn of Old Regimes: Washington Court Culture and Its Endless Wars

William J. Astore | Posted 07.12.2011

William J. Astore

Our wars are eerily like those pursued by European monarchs in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: conflicts carried out by professional militaries, largely funded by deficit spending, to protect the interests of a ruling elite.

Where Have All the Graveyards Gone? The War That Didn't End War and Its Unending Successors

Adam Hochschild | Posted 07.03.2011

Adam Hochschild

Would the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan come to a halt more quickly if we could see hundreds of thousands of tombstones, military and civilian, spreading hill after hill, field after field, across our landscape?

Sleepwalking Into the Imperial Dark: What It Feels Like When a Superpower Runs Off the Tracks

Tom Engelhardt | Posted 06.19.2011

Tom Engelhardt

Have you noticed how repetitiously our president and others insist that we are "the greatest nation on Earth"? When the U.S. was actually "the greatest," no one needed to say it over and over again.

Not Why, But How: To the Shores of (and Skies Above) Tripoli

Andrew Bacevich | Posted 06.12.2011

Andrew Bacevich

Motive is slippery. Presidents may not agree on exactly what we are trying to achieve in the Middle East, but for the past several decades, they have agreed on means: whatever it is we want done, military might holds the key to doing it.

Six Vows to Support Our Troops

William J. Astore | Posted 05.25.2011

William J. Astore

Let's start listening to them. And when we do -- when we begin to recognize them in all their frailty and complexity -- we'll realize they're as restless and conflicted about our wars as many of us are.

The Decline and Fall of the American Empire: Four Scenarios for the End of the American Century by 2025

Alfred W. McCoy | Posted 05.25.2011

Alfred W. McCoy

Instead of the bloodshed that marked the end of so many past empires, this 21st-century imperial collapse could come relatively quietly through the invisible tendrils of economic collapse or cyberwarfare.

Stealth Empire

Michael Brenner | Posted 05.25.2011

Michael Brenner

What is the connection between escalation, promised force reduction, and our commitment to a "success" in Afghanistan? A mature country poses these questions and insists on plausible answers. The U.S. does none of this.

Celebrate or Salivate: What Does Your Veteran's Day Look Like?

Lori Bell | Posted 05.25.2011

Lori Bell

What is this day of honoring Vets really all about? Do we really celebrate the sacrifices and accomplishments of veterans or salivate at the opportunity to increase a bottom line?

The New American Isolationism: The Cost of Turning Away From War's Horrific Realities

William J. Astore | Posted 05.25.2011

William J. Astore

Marked by a calculated estrangement from war's horrific realities and mercenary purposes, the new isolationism magically turns an historic term on its head, for it keeps usinwars, rather than out of them.

The Longest Day and the Longest War

Saul Friedman | Posted 05.25.2011

Saul Friedman

The wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere have cost our treasury one trillion dollars. Imagine what even part of that could have done for health care, education and decrepit schools.

Believe It or Not (2010 Imperial Edition): U.S. War-Fighting Numbers to Knock Your Socks Off

Tom Engelhardt | Posted 05.25.2011

Tom Engelhardt

Believe it or not, the staggering logistics effort underway to transport part of the American way of war from Iraq to Afghanistan is now being compared by those involved to Hannibal crossing the Alps with his cohort of battle elephants.

War Dead

Jeff Danziger | Posted 05.25.2011

Jeff Danziger

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Obama Wants Record $708 Billion For Wars Next Year

Posted 05.25.2011

(AP) WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama will ask Congress for an additional $33 billion to fight unpopular wars in Afghanistan and Iraq on top of a ...

Charlie Wilson: I'd Probably Shut Down The War In Afghanistan

The Huffington Post | Posted 05.25.2011

Charlie Wilson, the former Democratic representative from Texas and the inspiration for the movie (and book) Charlie Wilson's War sat down with the Sc...