Club America
by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services When Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman pulled up to Savannah, Ga., after his legendary March to the Sea in December 1864, he was savagely slandered in the Southern press as a renegade leader of a “vandal horde.”
Did Iraq Really Ruin the U.S.?
by Victor Davis Hanson The Australian Financial Review A shorter version of this essay recently appeared in the Australian Financial Review Writing of the decline of the West — and the United States in particular — has been a parlor game from the time of doomsayers Oswald Spengler and Arnold Toynbee to Paul Kennedy’s pessimism of […]
If We Fail…
Been there, done that. by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online Most Americans accept that if the United States cannot stabilize Iraq, and, in frustration and acrimony, withdraws in defeat, crises follow. The only disagreement is over how bad they will be.
Global Schizophrenia
by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services When it comes to intervening in international affairs, the United States is damned when it does and damned when it doesn’t. Critics of U.S. policy are always quick to pounce — and in this age of globalization, they’re only getting more impatient.
The Surge Gamble
All eyes now turn to Baghdad and Sadr City. by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online This was not Churchill, not FDR, and not JFK Wednesday night, and there was not quite enough about winning and victory — but the content was still good enough.
Just Deserts
Separating Hussein’s execution from therapy. by Bruce S. Thornton Private Papers In Mark Twain’s Tom Sawyer, a “committee of sappy women” petition the governor to pardon the murderous Injun Joe.
A War of Endurance
by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services As we begin a new year, with a new Congress being sworn in Thursday, it’s a good time to take stock of the “global war on terror.” The enormous conventional military power of the United States probably ensures that we will not lose in Iraq, Afghanistan and beyond. […]
The Sense of Good
American confidence necessary to succeed in a war for freedom. by Bruce S. Thornton Private Papers The execution of Saddam Hussein should be a moment of celebration for Americans.
Stasis or Victory?
A surge in troops will fail miserable unless we correct past laxity. by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online There are troop surges, and then there are troop surges, in military history. Some radically alter the calculus of the battlefield. Others simply add to the stasis and sense of quagmire, ending up as nothing more than […]
Beyond the Braggadocio: Iran’s Ahmandinejad Far Weaker Than He Lets On
by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services The Iraq Study Group, prominent U.S. Senators and realist diplomats all want America to hold formal talks with the government of Iran. They think Tehran might help the United States disengage from Iraq and the general Middle East mess with dignity. That would be a grave error for […]
Why Radical Islam–And Why Now?
by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services Read any newspaper or turn on any news broadcast and you’re bound to encounter stories of Islamic radicals fighting, killing and threatening each other — and just about everyone else.
A Symphony Unheard
Go see The Nativity Story by Craig Bernthal Private Papers Here is the plot and the theme: God creates the universe, not because he needs to, since he is complete in himself, but as an act of gratuitous love.
What Is Annanism?
The triumph of the therapeutic over the tragic. by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online Everyone seems to take some joy in listening to outgoing secretary-general of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, especially during the holidays. But just as with other such ethicists as a lip-biting Bill Clinton or creased-browed Jimmy Carter, Annan is as publicly […]
High Anxiety
How modernity feeds Arab anti-Semitism by Bruce S. Thornton Private Papers There’s an Elvis Costello lyric that goes, “I used to be disgusted; now I try to be amused.”
Talking to Iran: Moral and Strategic Mistake
by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services One of the many bizarre recommendations in the recently released report from the bipartisan Iraq Study Group is the call to talk with Iran. A formal dialogue with the present Iranian leadership is, for a number of reasons, as misguided as it is amoral.
War-Making and the Machines of War
by Victor Davis Hanson Commentary Magazine (December 2006) In recent years, the term “revolution in military affairs” (RMA) has come to be applied to the vast change that computerized intelligence and globalization have brought to the conduct of war. This catchy sobriquet, however, is only a new name for something very old. In fact, radical transformations […]
Israel Did it!
When in doubt, shout about Israel. by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online These are strange times. Perennially beleaguered Israel, for instance, was hit all summer long with rockets from Lebanon and Gaza, as the world watched and kept score in an absurd new game of proportionality:
Our Pearl Harbor
by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services On Dec. 7, 1941 — 65 years ago this week — pilots from a Japanese carrier force bombed Pearl Harbor. They killed 2,403 Americans, most of them service personnel, while destroying much of the American fleet and air forces stationed in Hawaii.
Losing the Enlightenment
A civilization that has lost confidence in itself cannot confront Islamists. by Victor Davis Hanson WSJ Opinion Journal Our current crisis is not yet a catastrophe, but a real loss of confidence of the spirit. The hard-won effort of the Western Enlightenment of some 2,500 years that, along with Judeo-Christian benevolence, is the foundation of […]
Blood and Oil
by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services With the gruesome killing of former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko, Vladimir Putin’s Russia stands accused of poisoning yet another critic.