By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on February 14, 2015
The National Security Strategy is never a riveting read, and the NSS put out by the Obama administration on Feb. 6, only their second (the last in May 2010), was no exception. “Strategic patience” was the mantra with which this NSS was launched, to fairly wide derision as a rationalisation of the last six years of hesitancy and retrenchment. It was a criticism with some basis in fact. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on December 6, 2014
Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi gave his eighth speech[1] since becoming the leader of the Islamic State (ISIS), entitled, “Even if the Disbelievers Despise Such”, on November 13, 2014. The speech was notable for two things. First, it taunted the American-led coalition about the lack of success their campaign has had against ISIS since it began in June and was extended into Syria in September, and invited the U.S. and other Western states to deploy ground troops. Secondly, the speech accepted the pledges of allegiance from groups outside Syria and Iraq for the first time, from Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Egypt, Libya, and Algeria. In Saudi Arabia and Yemen, the groups that have joined ISIS are unknown. In Egypt, the group is Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis (The Partisans of Jerusalem). In Libya, the group is al-Majlis Shura Shabab al-Islam (The Islamic Youth Consultation Council). And in Algeria the group is Jund al-Khalifa (Soldiers of the Caliphate). These areas will now become wilaya (provinces) of the caliphate, al-Baghdadi says, and ISIS will send a governor to oversee them. An English transcript of the speech was produced by ISIS and is reproduced below with important sections highlighted in bold. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on September 21, 2014
The next American President?
Last month, Jeffrey Goldberg at The Atlantic published an interview with Hillary Clinton. At 8,000 words it can be off-putting to plough through, but I have now finally got around to it, and it is rather interesting. The interview focusses on the three areas where President Obama’s foreign policy has so conspicuously failed—Syria, Iran, and Israel—and also includes sections on Egypt and Libya, where the administration’s failure has been somewhat less in the news. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on August 27, 2014
Devastated International Airport in Tripoli, Aug. 23, 2014
With the Arabian Revolt sweeping the Middle East in early 2011, Libya’s turn came on February 17. Throwing off decades of fear, and not bothering with peaceful demonstrations as Tunisia and Egypt had to free themselves of tyranny, nor the Syrians who tried peaceful demonstrations for six entire months, the Libyans went straight to armed rebellion, and soon the city of Benghazi had been pried from the regime’s grip and become the de facto capital of the revolution. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on August 9, 2014
Released on December 21, 2007, twenty-eight years to the month after the Soviet Union launched Operation STORM 333, decapitating the Afghan government and plunging the country into a decade-long war, Charlie Wilson’s War tells a story centred on Representative Charles Wilson of Texas (Tom Hanks), a conservative Democrat, Joanne Herring (Julia Roberts), a Right-wing Christian socialite in Houston who has taken the Afghans to her bosom because of her hatred for communism, and Gust Avrakotos (Philip Seymour Hoffman), a blue-collar case officer at the CIA who is the epitome of the adage that one can get anything done in Washington so long as one does not care who gets the credit. Between them they cajole Congress into moving its appropriations from $5 million to $500 million, which will be matched dollar-for-dollar by the Saudis, to help the Afghan resistance combat the Red Army’s occupation of their country. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on May 12, 2014
While the Sisi regime presents itself to the West as a barrier against Islamism, its internal propaganda delegitimizes the Islamists by presenting them as the cat’s paw of the United States, playing on the widespread anti-Americanism in Egypt
David Kirkpatrick on The New York Times front-page brought the news everyone following Egypt already knows: the putschists in Cairo have reneged on their promises of pluralism and religious tolerance, which was part of their sell in bringing off the coup last July. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on April 24, 2014
Tony Blair at Bloomberg on April 23
There’s a case to be made that Tony Blair is the most important figure in the development of the concept of “humanitarian intervention” since the end of the Cold War. When adumbrating his doctrine at the Chicago Economics Club in April 1999, Blair made very clear that this was no wild-eyed utopianism. Continue reading
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