... feels entitled to a leading role, Americans feel challenged in their self perceived providential entitlement to be a “beacon for humanity”.
About the author:
Alfredo Toro Hardy is a Venezuelan retired diplomat, scholar and author. He has a PhD on International Relations and several master and postgraduate degrees. Before retiring from the Venezuelan Foreign Service, he was one of his country’s most senior career diplomats, having served as Ambassador to the United States, the United Kingdom,...
As the Western philosopher George Santayana said, “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
The controversial “Thucydides trap” argument has sparked a heated debate since 2013, when President
Xi Jinping
of China told a cluster of western guests: “We must all work together to avoid Thucydides’ trap.” Later, this concept was elucidated by Professor Graham Allison in his articles, talks and famous book
Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides’ Trap
. So, what...
... biodiversity, environmental stability and resource sufficiency constitute another dimension to the crisis.
Today, a lot of attention all around the world is focused on US President Donald Trump as the most visible and the most powerful troublemaker in international relations. Without going into details, I would say that the peculiar policy of the current American president helped us to some extent to look more realistically at the state of affairs on international arena.
First, two and a half years ...
... respectively the place and time for the chief of ISIS to finally meet his demise. To mention again historical precedents, prominent terrorist leaders such as Al-Baghdadi seem amazingly successful at this hide and seek game. It is impossible to forget how Usama Bin Laden evaded - admittedly with surprising effectiveness - the best efforts of the intelligence services of half the world at locating him for more than a decade. Then, conveniently, he was found living the good life very quietly in the backyard ...
October 1st began what could be one of the more interesting Chairships of the United Nations Security Council, with Russia taking over and being charged with a rather delicate balancing act: between conducting the numerous affairs expected to be covered by any standard Chair of the UNSC and deftly handling the ‘special’ relationship with the United States that has recently become woefully deficient. Even more intriguing, some of the most vivid recent examples of that degrading relationship...
... have had to fend off as an entire party in the past generation of presidential races: that Democrats are too focused on domestic affairs and are unfit or inexperienced to handle world affairs. In essence, Democrats always have to defend against the accusation of being foreign policy weaklings. This accusation is never leveled against Republican candidates (even when a particular candidate may be internationally amateurish, his party’s reputational legacy is apparently automatically transferred ...
... near future, especially given the latest developments in the relations between the West and Russia.
While the spark that lit the fire in Cuba had been shot by the USSR’s attempt to install nuclear missiles right in front of the coast of the USA, this time around the roles are reversed. Indeed, although in international relations there are hardly ever any instances where both parties involved don't share at least a small portion of the responsibility for a crisis – and arguably that also applies to the case at hand – the United States ...
... and malleable minds. Only now it is being powerfully pushed through the technological and virtual advantages of the 21st century, making its reach and scope far beyond anything the West could ever think plausible.
Against this backdrop, it is inexcusable that American agents find themselves at a loss to understand the appeal of that small percentage willing to abandon the U.S. and go fight in a land that America says is barbarous, for a group only more barbarous and a cause most ignoble. To see ...
... the point. At least it will guard against overly politicizing the issues, which is harming our countries and the world.
Another important point: I believe that it is vital to separate the
discourse
about Russia's political agenda with the problems of international relations. Such discourse is needed. Likewise a consultation on the changes that have taken place in U.S. domestic politics is needed. A tasty appetizer was served recently by
Mikhail Gorbachev
, who called for perestroika in the United ...
... newcomers to the drone party will do what the U.S. has not is simply illogical. All of this consternation revolves around four fundamental questions that the United States has been unwise to ignore and the honest answers, based on previous American drone usage, probably carry some severe repercussions for American foreign and military policies: Who is controlling the weapon system? Does the system of control and oversight violate international law governing the use of force? Are drone strikes proportionate ...
