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foreign affairs in strategic context
Browsing All Posts filed under »First World War«
Sykes-Picot is not to blame for Syria
For many in the Arab world, the Sykes-Picot Agreement is what the Yalta conference was for many conservatives in the United States during the Cold War. It is a betrayal of a people seeking freedom, a damning indictment of Great Power politics, and the source of all the problems in the Middle East. As with […]
Afghanistan and the Great (Blame) Game
May 26, 2011
The former UK representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, has written a new book about his time in the region. I’m usually sceptical of contemporary political memoirs, but I thought I’d take a chance with this one, and it arrived this morning. His views about the conflict have been trailed in The Guardian […]
The risk of a Dolchstosslegende after Libya
March 16, 2011
Whenever arguing about intervention in Libya, I always ask interventionists how militarily viable the rebels were in the first place. I felt the answer was important because if the rebels were a lame horse from the start of the race, which seems to have been the case, then whatever equipment we sent them might fall […]
What to do in Libya?
March 10, 2011
The clamour for a no-fly zone over Libya is deafening; and so frightening is the sound that politicians may soon lose their heads and concede to creating one. I keep asking myself: what would the no-fly zone be for? James Forsyth, political editor of The Spectator magazine, seems to think it’d help the rebels defeat […]
Michael Burgoyne: Old Luk-Oie and military adaptation
February 9, 2011
I am pleased to publish a guest post by Michael Burgoyne, as he has been more than helpful to me with some of my writing. Michael is a Major in the United States Army and author of The Defense of Jisr al-Doreaa. Incidentally, his co-author Jim Marckwardt will be discussing full spectrum operations at the […]
A peace to end all peace
January 3, 2011
The historian Margaret MacMillan wrote an interesting op-ed for The New York Times the other week, about reparations and the First World War. I stopped reading after a few paragraphs because it sounded like a load of balls, but I went back to it and the article has its merits. The thing I objected to […]
Ambivalent? Yeah, maybe.
November 5, 2010
Kenneth Payne has interesting pieces at Current Intelligence and on the BBC about the supposed ambivalence towards war felt in this country. Not to be facetious, but I’m ambivalent about them. It is true the British public are uninformed and uninvolved with Afghanistan, and that they are uninterested in defence policy generally. But I don’t […]
Conservatives and the threat from Germany 1902-1914
September 13, 2010
This is the first part in my series looking at the British Conservative Party and the First World War. The topic brings together many interests of mine from international relations in the early 20th Century to the ‘strategic culture’ of the Party and the nexus of foreign policy and domestic politics. My dissertation examined it […]
Joe Chamberlain, bitch!
September 12, 2010
I’m sure the whole two people interested in early 20th Century British politics and international relations cannot wait for my first post on the Conservatives and the First World War, but I thought I’d put this video up as a teaser. Joe Chamberlain, bitch!
August 16, 2012
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