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Think Again: Al Qaeda
By Jason Burke
The mere mention of al Qaeda conjures images of an efficient terrorist network guided by a powerful criminal mastermind. Yet al Qaeda is more lethal as an ideology than as an organization. Al Qaedaism will continue to attract supporters in the years to comewhether Osama bin Laden is around to lead them or not.
The Terrorist Notebooks
By Martha Brill Olcott and Bakhtiyar Babajanov
During the mid-1990s, a group of young Uzbeks went to school to learn how to kill you. In an FP exclusive, their newly discovered notebooks illuminate the methods and mind-set of Islamic terrorists in Central Asia and the challenges facing policymakers in the war on terrorism.
Islams Medieval Outposts
By Husain Haqqani
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld says that the United States must combat the anti-American influence of radical Islamic seminaries (madrasas), lest they become breeding grounds for the next generation of terrorists. FP explores how these universities of jihad are spreading their theology worldwide.
Post-Terror Surprises
By Moiss Nam
One consequence of September 11 is the emergence of a more sobering, less naive understanding of globalization.
The Gospel of Jihad
By Husain Haqqani
Pakistan’s jihad authors tie political struggle to scripture.
Al Qaeda, the NGO
By Moiss Nam
Can floundering political parties learn a few lessons from al Qaeda?
The Empire Rarely Strikes Back
By Fernando Reinares
Although terrorists attacked U.S. interests more than 2,400 times between 1983 and 1998, the United States responded with overt military action only three times.
The Rise of Complex Terrorism
By Thomas Homer-Dixon
Modern societies face a cruel paradox: Fast-paced technological and economic innovations may deliver unrivalled prosperity, but they also render rich nations vulnerable to crippling, unanticipated attacks. By relying on intricate networks and concentrating vital assets in small geographic clusters, advanced Western nations only amplify the destructive power of terroristsand the psychological and financial damage they can inflict.
Revisiting the Superterrorism Debate
By Ehud Sprinzak
There is little doubt that the catastrophic attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon have transformed our understanding of terrorism. Not only has the disaster changed the nature of this type of warfare, but it has also put the history of terrorism and the writing of this history in a new perspective.
Rational Fanatics
By Ehud Sprinzak
Long before 9/11, terrorist groups were embracing “human bombs” as their ultimate weapon from Chechnya to Sri Lanka. They could have been stopped.
The Great Superterrorism Scare
By Ehud Sprinzak
Official Washington had long imagined a “superterrorist” attack using weapons of mass destruction. The rhetoric and resources that policymakers used to prevent it were nothing but counterproductive.
Think Again: Terrorism
By John Deutch
Back in 1997, John Deutch, the former director of central intelligence, warned that the U.S. bureaucracy was ill-prepared to address the terrorist threat.
The Other Evil
By Strobe Talbott
If you want to win the war on terrorism, start by draining the water in which the terrorists swim. Revisiting the Case for War
By Joseph Cirincione, Dipali Mukhopadhyay and Alexis Orton
Even after President George Bush’s own weapons hunter, David Kay, could not find any weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the administration continues to claim there was ample evidence that Saddam Hussein had a nuclear weapons program. A close look at President Bush’s October 7, 2002, speech in Cincinnati, Ohio, where he detailed the case for war against Iraq, reveals a gap between what the president said and what U.S. intelligence analysts believed at the time.
Intelligence Test
By Richard J. Aldrich
Intelligence agencies grow bigger, not better.
Smarter Intelligence
By John Deutch and Jeffrey H. Smith
What’s needed to fix U.S. counterterrorism intelligence? Not more spies and not the power to kill terrorist leaders. Instead, argue two top former CIA officials, let the director of central intelligence break down the walls between domestic and foreign intelligence gathering.
Think Again: Spies
By Loch K. Johnson
How are spies adapting to a world of search engines, commercial satellite imagery, and greater transparency?
Psychology and the CIA: Leaders on the Couch
By Thomas Omestad
When psychological profiles are done well, they can help prepare presidents and senior officials for crises or negotiations. When the profiles are done poorly, they misinform and mislead. Too often, it has been the latter.
Iraq’s False Promises
By Slavoj Zizek
Americans are not buying the Bush administration’s reasons for the Iraq war, despite a recent string of public justifications by the President claiming that Saddam Hussein’s WMD capability posed a “real and present danger.” The administration’s tangled web of incoherent reasoning and aggressive pursuit of contradictory goals in Iraq can only be unraveled by the equally twisted logic of a Freudian dream sequence.
Revisiting the Case for War
By Joseph Cirincione, Dipali Mukhopadhyay and Alexis Orton
Even after President George Bush’s own weapons hunter, David Kay, could not find any weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the administration continues to claim there was ample evidence that Saddam Hussein had a nuclear weapons program. A close look at President Bush’s October 7, 2002, speech in Cincinnati, Ohio, where he detailed the case for war against Iraq, reveals a gap between what the president said and what U.S. intelligence analysts believed at the time.
From Victory to Success: Afterwar Policy in Iraq
In this special report, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, working with FP, seeks to address some of the afterwars most pressing issues and to offer a framework for turning victory into success.
Blessed Are the Warmakers? A Debate Between Daniel Cohn-Bendit and Richard Perle
The United States and the European Union both want peace in the Middle Eastbut thats about all they agree upon. While Washington believes that regime change in Iraq will usher in an era of regional peace and stability, Brussels worries that U.S. adventurism will make the clash of civilizations a self-fulfilling prophecy. Will war in Iraq prove to be an act of creative destruction, or simply destruction? Two outspoken thinkers from opposite sides of the AtlanticRichard Perle, a key national security advisor to the Pentagon, and Daniel Cohn-Bendit, leader of the European Parliaments Green Partytraded views and barbs at a debate in Washington, D.C.
The American Mongols
By Husain Haqqani
The last time infidels conquered Baghdad was in 1258, when the Mongol horde defeated the caliphate that had ruled for more than five centuries. And if the ripple effects of that episode through Islams history are any guide, the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq will unleash a new cycle of hatredunless President George W. Bush can fulfill his promises of democracy in Iraq and a Palestinian state.
An Unnecessary War
By John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt
In the full-court press for war with Iraq, the Bush administration deems Saddam Hussein reckless, ruthless, and not fully rational. Such a man, when mixed with nuclear weapons, is too unpredictable to be prevented from threatening the United States, the hawks say. But scrutiny of his past dealings with the world shows that Saddam, though cruel and calculating, is eminently deterrable.
A Grand Strategy of Transformation
By John Lewis Gaddis
President George W. Bush’s national security strategy could represent the most sweeping shift in U.S. grand strategy since the beginning of the Cold War. But its success depends on the willingness of the rest of the world to welcome U.S. power with open arms.
Think Again: Attacking Iraq
By Mark Strauss
Saddam Hussein backs anti-U.S. terrorists, has a nasty arsenal that weapons inspectors won’t find, and isn’t essential to the survivial of a unified Iraq. But that still doesn’t mean that Iraq should be “phase two” in the war against global terrorism.

Bush Throws a Party
By Kenneth Rogoff
Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan warns that the rising budget deficit poses a risk to the U.S. economy. But before commentators start crying foul about George W. Bush’s economic policies, just how does the president’s preelection spending binge rate against his predecessors?
If I Were President.
By Sen. John Kerry
Last year, FP asked several Democratic hopefuls to articulate their vision of the United States role in the world and explain how they would lead the nation better than President George W. Bush. Senator John Kerry, the presumptive Democratic candidate, argues that American leadership means we must listen to the cultures and histories of other countries and work harder to build coalitions and partnerships.
Grading the President
Today, some of the United States’ critics wax nostalgic about Bill Clinton, forgetting that they derided him during his presidency’s early years as inexperienced and indecisive. Will the world learn to love President George W. Bush? FP asks nine noted contributors to grade Bush and interpret how he’s seen in their corners of the globe.
Revenge of the Clintonites
If Senator John Kerry ousted President George W. Bush in the November elections, what would his foreign policy look like? Take a glance back to the Clinton White House for a clue. During the primaries, FP asked several Democratic candidates to provide a list of their key foreign-policy advisors. Top hands from former President Bill Clinton’s ship stood out among the names they provided. Senator Kerry’s campaign identified more than a dozen advisors, many of whom are regional experts that meet weekly in what one Kerry advisor calls a mini or shadow NSC [National Security Council].
Prime Numbers: The 5 Percent Solution
By David Makovsky and Eran Benedek
Habitually described as a major obstacle to peace, the dispute over Israeli settlements can be resolved by using a careful hand to redraw just 5 percent of the West Bank map. Approximately 63,800 people, or just 1 percent of Israels Jewish population, would need to be uprooted to make a two-state solution possible.
Think Again: Yasir Arafat
By Dennis B. Ross
In 1974, Yasir Arafat, chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization, declared before the United Nations that he came bearing an olive branch and a freedom-fighters gun. Nearly 20 years later, the world still does not know if Arafat is a statesman dedicated to peaceful coexistence with Israel or a resistance leader dedicated to armed struggle. According to the former lead negotiator on the Middle East peace process in the first Bush and both Clinton administrations, understanding Arafats true motives will be essential to fostering a lasting agreement.
Irreconcilable Differences
By Shlomo Avineri
Only when Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat disappears from the scene and a less traumatized Israel elects a more moderate prime minister may there be a new opportunity for meaningful negotiations.
Why Peace Doesnt Pay
By Aluf Benn
During the peace negotiations of the 1990s, Israel went from a pariah state to an integrated member of the global economy. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon yearns for a return to the status quo of the last decade: a never-ending peace process that is more profitable than war but that sidesteps the bold concessions necessary for peace.
Samuel Huntington Answers His Critics
Samuel Huntingtons controversial essay, The Hispanic Challenge (March/April 2004), has produced unprecedented international media coverage and sparked a global debate on the impact of Latino immigrants in the United States. Reactions from academics, activists, and concerned readers offer new insights on this crucial topicas does Huntingtons response to his critics.
The Hispanic Challenge
By Samuel Huntington
The persistent inflow of Hispanic immigrants threatens to divide the United States into two peoples, two cultures, and two languages. Unlike past immigrant groups, Mexicans and other Latinos have not assimilated into mainstream America, forming instead their own political and linguistic enclaves and rejecting the Anglo-Protestant principles that built the American dream.
Migration’s New Payoff
By Devesh Kapur and John McHale
Every day, migrants working in rich countries send money to their families in the developing world. In 2002, these remittances added up to $80 billion, outstripping foreign aid. Find out why remittances boomed in the 1990sand how this money is lifting entire nations out of poverty, rewiring international politics, and reshaping immigration policy.
Can Refugees Help?
By Alexious Butler
African leaders are reluctant to welcome refugees into their countries, citing security concerns and overburdened budgets, schools, and hospitals. But, refugees can offer great short-term and long-term economic benefits to host states and communities in Africa.
Double Ties
By David A. Martin and T. Alexander Aleinikoff
Why nations should learn to love dual nationality.
On the Fence
An interview with Doris Meissner, the ex-commissioner of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, who spent seven years dealing with refugee crises, a schizophrenic Congress, and interest groups from the fans of Elito the friends of Sikhs. The New Diaspora
By MoisNa/span>
New links between grand their home countries can become a powerful force for economic development.
Think Again: Migration
By Demetrios G. Papademetriou
Seven out of eight newcomers to the world’s richest countries arrive by well-regulated channels, but you wouldn’t know it from listening to most politicians or the press. A look at the myths and realities of migration.
Immigration Debate: Myths About Immigrants
By Jeffrey S. Passel and Michael Fix
Erecting barriers (physical as well as legal) to immigration and pulling up the figurative drawbridge to protect American society are likely to dissipate those advantages that the United States has acquired over the last generation.
Think Again: International Trade
By Arvind Panagariya
Why have disagreements between rich and poor nations stalled the global trading system? Because vapid debates over fair trade obscure some inconvenient facts: First, notwithstanding their demands for equity, poor countries are more protectionist than advanced economies. Second, if rich nations cut their self-defeating agricultural subsidies, their own publics would benefit, but consumers in many poor countries would not. Finally, despite criticisms to the contrary, the World Trade Organization can help promote economic development in low-income countriesbut only if rich nations let the global body do its job.
Irrelevant WTO
Protesters who went to Cancn, Mexico for the World Trade Organization meeting wasted their time. But, then again, so did all the delegates. Why? Because the WTO doesnt actually do anything to liberalize trade, according to recent research by Andrew Rose, an economist and free trade advocate at the University of California, Berkeley.
FP Debate: Happily Ever NAFTA?
The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has sparked fierce academic and political disputesnot to mention an armed rebellion or two. Has NAFTA delivered or disappointed? The answer will go a long way toward determining the future of regional trade pacts. In this FP debate, U.S. critics clash with Mexicos original NAFTA architects on whether free trade in North America is a blessing or a curse.
Trading in Illusions
By Dani Rodrik
The notion that free trade and open capital markets offer poor nations a sure path to prosperity has gained worldwide currency. Unfortunately, the high costs and uncertain gains of integration suggest that joining the global economy isnt always such a smart investment.
FP Interview: Loris War
Ten years ago, Lori Wallach was a budding public-interest lawyer. Today, shes Public Enemy Number One in corporate boardrooms and multilateral economic institutions around the world. Dont know her? You should. An unprecedented in-depth interview with the leader of the protests that helped spike U.S. fast-track trade legislation, the Multilateral Agreement on Investment, and the 1999 World Trade Organization meeting in Seattle.