Africa

"What happens when, after another dozen major attacks, the chain of their barbarism outpaces the chain of our human solidarity? When is the permissible moment to start asking if we can muster as much wisdom and realism to fight terror as we do to harness emotions of solidarity? The recent increasing pace and widening geographic scope of terror suggest we are dealing with a qualitatively new kinds of terrorists — but the policy responses of governments and the emotional responses of entire societies suggest we have no idea how to respond to quell this monster."

"Beijing's intentions are thoroughly aquatic: it is interested in power projection across water, not land. The facility in Djibouti is likely to be the first such instalment around the Indian Ocean from which Beijing can in the future protect the maritime trade routes which are so crucial to its economy. The fact that Djibouti is located at the crucial choke point through which vessels traversing the Suez Canal must pass only enhances its attractiveness as a base location."

"Like clockwork, every several weeks, someone discovers a new document that, to their minds, “proves” that what the administration and the intelligence community have been saying about Benghazi is a bunch of lies. But time and again these documents don’t add up. They don’t show what the pundits think they show—and the Benghazi broadsides miss their mark anew."



 

"The more the Global War On Terror continues, the greater seems to be the expansion and impact of the very terror groups it seeks to defeat, with ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra being the most recent examples. During the last few months that I have spent in the United States, I have wondered, with growing perplexity, why there is so little discussion here of why the GWOT seems only to have sparked the continued birth and expansion of international militant and terror groups across the Arab-African-Asian region."

"It is fitting that Egyptian armed forces commander Field Marshal Abdel Fattah Sisi has decided to assume the presidency of his country, because two of the three main problems that Egypt faces are a consequence of his own decisions during the past year. These are the massive schism in society between the Muslim Brotherhood that he banned and the rest of the country, and the continuing tradition of military control over civilian politics and national governance (the third problem is the chronic issue of economic growth that can create enough jobs for the two million + Egyptians born every year)."

"We will know in the coming months whether the current “second chance” roadmap to constitutional reform in Egypt achieves that transition to democratic legitimacy that was mismanaged in the two years after the overthrow of the Hosni Mubarak regime. Equally significant in the short term is the current tension in Egypt revolving around the growing resistance to the transitional government’s new laws restricting public demonstrations and allowing civilians to be tried in military courts."

In the June 14 edition of The Washington Post, David Ignatius advocates for a Syria policy that effectively weaves together events in Syria with what's happening across the Middle East by firmly supporting moderates, encouraging respect for pluralism and the rule of law, and resisting sectarian violence.

"The Obama administration is working with its allies to frame a strategy to combat what might be called 'al-Qaeda 2.0' — an evolving, morphing terrorist threat that lacks a coherent center but is causing growing trouble in chaotic, poorly governed areas such as Libya, Yemen, Syria and Mali," writes David Ignatius.

"So it turns out that the top brass at the CIA had an inbox of secrets of the all-too-human, sexual variety. Titillating, unquestionably. But what about the other secrets – the intelligence secrets that are the agency’s reason for existence? How are they doing on this score? When the uproar passes over the personal misjudgements of Gen. David Petraeus, the country will be left with this question of intelligence goals and missions. And here’s where an overlooked problem of the Petraeus era should be fixed," writes David Ignatius in the Washington Post.

"A detailed CIA timeline of the assault on U.S. facilities in Benghazi paints an anguishing picture of embattled Americans waiting for Libyan security forces who didn’t come and courageous CIA officers who died on a rooftop without the heavy weapons they needed, trying to protect their colleagues below," writes David Ignatius of the Washington Post, as he provideds a minute-by-minute accound of September 11 attacks the U.S. Embassy in Libya.