South Asia

In “The American War,” Washington Post Opinion columnist Alyssa Rosenberg interviews the filmmakers of the new PBS documentary, "The Vietnam War." Professor Fredrik Logevall, an adviser to the film, shares why Americans’ historical understanding of Vietnam is so limited to their own experiences.

A pioneer in the field of CVE (Countering Violent Extremism), Farah Pandith spent over a decade developing strategies to prevent and defend against the spread of extremist ideology, a policy area that has been under the microscope since President Trump declared his intention to “unite the civilized world against radical Islamic terrorism which we will eradicate completely from the face of the earth,” during his inaugural address on January 20^th.

At a Future of Diplomacy Project seminar on February 13, Pandith spoke about the evolution of CVE policy and the importance of soft power in combating the spread of extremist ideology. She identified three distinct phases in the development of US counter-terrorism strategy after September 11.

In many Western democracies, this is a year of revolt against elites. The success of the Brexit campaign in Britain, Donald Trump’s unexpected capture of the Republican Party in the United States, and populist parties’ success in Germany and elsewhere strike many as heralding the end of an era. As Financial Times columnist Philip Stephens put it, “the present global order – the liberal rules-based system established in 1945 and expanded after the end of the Cold War – is under unprecedented strain. Globalization is in retreat.”

In fact, it may be premature to draw such broad conclusions.

Some economists attribute the current surge of populism to the “hyper-globalization” of the 1990s, with liberalization of international financial flows and the creation of the World Trade Organization – and particularly China’s WTO accession in 2001 – receiving the most attention. According to one study, Chinese imports eliminated nearly one million US manufacturing jobs from 1999 to 2011; including suppliers and related industries brings the losses to 2.4 million.

"...[W]hat I'd really like to know is what the different candidates think about this issue, and hear them explain why U.S. taxpayers should pay a lot more than our allies’ citizens do and how Americans actually benefit from the energetic foreign policy that both GOP and Democratic stalwarts never even question. I'd also like to see reporters give them a good grilling on this topic, and refuse to accept vague or non-specific responses."

"When Washington goes to war on the basis of cooked intelligence, worst-case assumptions, and unsurpassed hubris, then other countries will be warier the next time we try to get them to line up alongside us....If foreign powers believe U.S. policy is driven more by domestic politics than by strategic imperatives, they'll view us with barely veiled contempt and meddle even more in our porous political system."