updated Sun. April 3, 2022
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LobeLog
March 30, 2018
by Paul R. Pillar Though fully justified, the sudden attention paid to the exploitation, including for political purposes, of information on millions of Facebook users in ways that ought to make those users uncomfortable—and to how Facebook does not seem… Continue ReadingÃÂ ...
LobeLog
March 27, 2018
by Paul R. Pillar. Donald Trump appears poised to make one of the most damaging moves yet of his presidency: to pull out of the multilateral agreement known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which severely restricts Iran's nuclear program and closes all pathways to a possible IranianÃÂ ...
RT
March 26, 2018
Former CIA operative Paul R. Pillar praised her apolitical relationship with the White House in an NPR article, as did her former supervisor, Robert Baer. The Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity memo however, closes with a recommendation that Trump rescinds the nomination in the name ofÃÂ ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
March 23, 2018
John Bolton has a glaring record of extreme and bombastic views and behavior. First-hand recollections of that record include, for example, former State Department officer Greg Thielmann's description of Bolton's performance as one of the most enthusiastic promoters of the Iraq War. The followingÃÂ ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
March 21, 2018
One of the more intriguing news reports about the rapid rise to power of the 32-year-old Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman (MbS), concerns how he isolated his mother, placing her under house arrest for a time. He kept her away from his father, the mentally declining King Salman, and devisedÃÂ ...
Just Security
March 20, 2018
Saudi Arabia's U.S.-backed military campaign in Yemen, now almost three years old, not only drives the world's worst humanitarian crisis, but also deepens the terrorist threat to the United States. After more than 1,000 days of war, 22 million Yemenis – more than the population of Florida – needÃÂ ...
New York Times
March 13, 2018
President Trump announced on Tuesday that he would nominate Mike Pompeo, the director of the C.I.A., to be the next secretary of state now that Rex Tillerson has been pushed out. This is bad news for the country and the world. If confirmed, Mr. Pompeo will bring to the job not the discretion and objectivityÃÂ ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
March 11, 2018
In July 1951, armistice talks began that eventually, after two years of difficult negotiations, would halt the Korean War. The locale was the city of Kaesong, which was just south of the 38th parallel but on the North Korean/Chinese side of the front line. The lead negotiator for United Nations forces was U.S.ÃÂ ...
LobeLog
March 7, 2018
Long after Donald Trump leaves office, analysts will continue to discuss the roots of his presidency's excesses and outrages. They will offer explanations about larger phenomena in politics and society that go beyond Trump himself and that helped to make possible the damage he has inflicted on theÃÂ ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
March 3, 2018
Vladimir Putin's video show about formidable new Russian strategic weapons, which took up half of the Russian president's recent state of the nation address, has given defense analysts plenty to chew on. The presentation, which Putin probably was aiming at his domestic audience as well as anÃÂ ...
LobeLog
February 28, 2018
by Paul R. Pillar. Later this week Secretary of Energy Rick Perry will lead a U.S. delegation to negotiate a possible nuclear cooperation agreement with Saudi Arabia. The subject already has been a point of contention between Riyadh and Washington. Saudi Arabia wants to establish a large-scale nuclearÃÂ ...
LobeLog
December 31, 1999
by Paul R. Pillar. John Bolton has a glaring record of extreme and bombastic views and behavior. First-hand recollections of that record include, for example, former State Department officer Greg Thielmann's description of Bolton's performance as one of the most enthusiastic promoters of the Iraq War.
NPR
December 31, 1999
Paul R. Pillar served in the CIA for 28 years. He is a nonresident senior fellow at the Center for Security Studies at Georgetown University. President Trump's nominee to be director of the Central Intelligence Agency, Gina Haspel, will become, if confirmed, the first career professional of the agency to riseÃÂ ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
December 31, 1999
The sudden attention to the exploitation, including for political purposes, of information on millions of Facebook users in ways that ought to make those users uncomfortable—and to how Facebook does not seem to have cared about such abuses—has been tardy and myopic even though the attention isÃÂ ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
February 25, 2018
The unethical blurring of private interests and public business is a hallmark of Donald Trump's presidency. That blurring has increasingly involved U.S. foreign policy. The possible effects on U.S. foreign relations may be subtle and largely out of public view, but they arise every time, for example, foreignÃÂ ...
LobeLog
February 19, 2018
The cauldron of intervention known as the Syrian war has recently become even more likely to boil over than it was just a few weeks ago. There are two immediate dangers of escalation. One is the outbreak of another war between Israel and its neighbors. A reminder of this danger has come from eventsÃÂ ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
February 17, 2018
The cauldron of intervention known as the Syrian war has recently become even more likely to boil over than it was just a few weeks ago. There are two immediate dangers of escalation. One is the outbreak of another war between Israel and its neighbors. A reminder of this danger has come from eventsÃÂ ...
LobeLog
February 9, 2018
by Paul R. Pillar. After more than a year of excesses by a president whom not only centrists and progressives but also a thinking conservative such as George Will can aptly assess to be the worst U.S. president ever, outrage fatigue has set in on many fronts. Throwing government ethics into the trash,ÃÂ ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
February 5, 2018
No matter how much some in the United States try to apply to the war in Yemen a Manichean template for seeing the conflict as a simple contest between good guys and bad guys, the complexities of the war keep intruding. Long overlooked has been how the supposedly good side—that is, the one onÃÂ ...
LobeLog
February 1, 2018
by Paul R. Pillar. The most frequent and regular interaction that I, as a then-serving intelligence officer, had with the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI—referred to orally as “hip-see”) was in the 1980s. Part of my duties involved preparation of weekly classified briefings, presentedÃÂ ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
January 31, 2018
The most frequent and regular interaction that I, as a then-serving intelligence officer, had with the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI—referred to orally as “hip-see”) was in the 1980s. Part of my duties involved preparation of weekly classified briefings, presented to the committeeÃÂ ...
LobeLog
January 30, 2018
by Paul R. Pillar. Fifty years ago this Tuesday, communist forces launched the assaults across South Vietnam known as the Tet Offensive. The offensive marked an inflection point in the Vietnam War. President Lyndon Johnson denied a request the following month from his military commander in Vietnam,ÃÂ ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
January 26, 2018
As recently as a generation or two ago, the mainstream of American politics observed an important limit whereby domestic politics did not operate beyond the nation's boundaries. This did not mean there weren't sharp differences and vigorous debate about foreign policy, often along party lines.
The National Interest Online (blog)
October 16, 2017
Russian interference in domestic American politics is a large and complicated story, full understanding of which is only beginning to be reached by the media and independent analysts. Some of the lessons and implications of that story, especially as it relates to the 2016 election, can only follow completionÃÂ ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
December 31, 1999
During the Cold War, no concept was more central to U.S. national security strategy and to the relationship between the superpowers than deterrence. The concept long predates the Cold War, of course, but during that four-decade competition between the United States and USSR, strategists and scholarsÃÂ ...
LobeLog
December 31, 1999
Published February 13, 2018 by Paul Pillar Leave a Comment ÷ 33462702800_1335fd034a_b. by Paul R. Pillar As anyone who has not been in a sensory deprivation tank for the past two years knows, quite a big deal was made of Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server while she was secretary… Continue Readingà...
The National Interest Online (blog)
December 31, 1999
As anyone who has not been in a sensory deprivation tank for the past two years knows, quite a big deal was made of Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server while she was secretary of state. President Trump has continued to refer from time to time to Mrs. Clinton's emails. The highlighting of thisÃÂ ...
Consortium News
December 23, 2017
President Trump and Ambassador Nikki Haley tried to bully the U.N. into accepting Trump's decision on Jerusalem as Israel's capital but – in a rare show of independence – most U.N. members pushed back, notes ex-CIA analyst Paul R. Pillar. By Paul R. Pillar. When North Korea began the Korean WarÃÂ ...
Consortium News
December 16, 2017
Bowing to Israeli-Saudi desires, the Trump administration is abusing the U.S. intelligence process to whip up a war fever against Iran, much like George W. Bush did on Iraq, reports ex-CIA analyst Paul R. Pillar. By Paul R. Pillar. The most widely remembered episode of a U.S. administration using anÃÂ ...
Center for Research on Globalization
December 15, 2017
Even as the Islamic State's “caliphate” in Syria collapses, the U.S. government is keeping about 2,000 soldiers in-country despite lacking any legal right to be there, as ex-CIA analyst Paul R. Pillar discusses. By Paul R. Pillar. Global Research, December 15, 2017. Consortiumnews 13 December 2017. Region: Middle EastÃÂ ...
LobeLog
December 12, 2017
The other day we learned that there are four times more U.S. troops in Syria than any earlier official figure had acknowledged. The discrepancy did not get much public attention perhaps because the numbers are small— about 2,000 troops in Syria, with the earlier official figure being 500—compared toÃÂ ...
Center for Research on Globalization
December 8, 2017
Trump's Scheme to Carve Up Palestine. President Trump's big idea for Israeli-Palestinian peace was the “outside-in” plan in which Israel's new Saudi allies would squeeze the Palestinians until they accepted a bogus “state,” as ex-CIA analyst Paul R. Pillar explains. By Paul R. Pillar. Global ResearchÃÂ ...
Consortium News
December 2, 2017
In trying to rally American hostility toward Iran, CIA Director Pompeo and other U.S. officials are engaging in the same kind of distorted intelligence that led to the catastrophic Iraq invasion, writes ex-CIA analyst Paul R. Pillar. By Paul R. Pillar. Although nobody knows exactly where Donald Trump intends toÃÂ ...
LobeLog
December 1, 2017
by Paul R. Pillar Although nobody knows exactly where Donald Trump intends to go with his campaign of seeking confrontation with Iran, his administration already has provided disconcerting parallels with the techniques an earlier U.S. administration used in selling its… Continue ReadingÃÂ ...
LobeLog
November 18, 2017
by Paul R. Pillar Anyone willing to think carefully and critically about the use of armed force against a target such as the Islamic State (ISIS or IS) would do well to ...
LobeLog
November 17, 2017
by Paul R. Pillar The anachronistic family enterprise known as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has long been politically fragile. In some respects it is remarkable ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
November 17, 2017
Anyone willing to think carefully and critically about the use of armed force against a target such as Islamic State (ISIS) would do well to read ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
November 13, 2017
Donald Trump seems eager to learn at the knee of Vladimir Putin. During his Asian trip, Trump expressed his willingness to believe Putin's ...
Consortium News
November 9, 2017
By Paul R. Pillar. The anachronistic family enterprise known as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has long been politically fragile. In some respects ...
LobeLog
November 8, 2017
by Paul R. Pillar. The anachronistic family enterprise known as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has long been politically fragile. In some respects ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
November 7, 2017
The anachronistic family enterprise known as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has long been politically fragile. In some respects it is remarkable ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
November 2, 2017
Donald Trump's tweets in response to the terrorist attack along a bike path in Manhattan demonstrated some of what we already knew all too ...
Center for Research on Globalization
November 1, 2017
Paul R. Pillar is Non-resident Senior Fellow at the Center for Security Studies of Georgetown University and an Associate Fellow of the Geneva ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
October 31, 2017
The latest attempt at reconciliation between the competing Palestinian parties Fatah and Hamas has produced a preliminary agreement that ...
LobeLog
October 30, 2017
by Paul R. Pillar. In Iraq, as in Syria, the imminent extinguishing of the mini-state of the so-called Islamic State (ISIS or IS) is raising the question ...
Consortium News
October 25, 2017
Paul R. Pillar, in his 28 years at the Central Intelligence Agency, rose to be one of the agency's top analysts. He is author most recently of Why ...
LobeLog
October 21, 2017
by Paul R. Pillar. The newest issue of Foreign Affairs features the theme of “America's Forgotten Wars,” with a cover illustration that juxtaposes a ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
October 16, 2017
Russian interference in domestic American politics is a large and complicated story, full understanding of which is only beginning to be reached ...
Consortium News
October 13, 2017
By Paul R. Pillar. Donald Trump's speech on Iran is the latest chapter in his struggle to reconcile his overriding impulse to denigrate and destroy ...
The National Interest Online (blog)
December 31, 1999
Trump's policies and rhetoric have caused international confidence in the United States to plummet to even lower depths. The United States' pushing ability has dropped along with the confidence. Paul R. Pillar is a contributing editor at the National Interest and the author of Intelligence and U.S. ForeignÃÂ ...
