How to explain the frantic efforts of Gordon Brown to stay at No 10? One seriously insane theory I have heard, and NB it is insane, runs as follows. Remember that idea that Tony Blair wants to be the first ‘President of Europe’ once the Lisbon Treaty comes into force? That […]
Alex Massie perceptively wonders whether there is anything to be done with North Korea other than Doing Nothing (Much), as every other option is fraught with problems. He kindly says that he would like to hear from me on the subject. Always pleased to oblige. Here goes. A policy is […]
Here is the full text of President Obama’s Cairo speech. It had many strong points. A friendly, open-hearted yet serious and businesslike tone. Lots of inclusive words such as ‘respect’ and ‘partnership’. Some quite firm lines on Israel and its right to exist, to the point of being seen as surprisingly […]
Last night I was back again at the Frontline Club to hear Allan Little talk to Nick Hawton about the latter’s new book The Quest for Radovan Karadzic: When everybody else seemed to have given the hunt, one journalist doggedly followed his trail, travelling from the snow-capped mountains of Montenegro […]
Was there a massacre by Sri Lankan forces as they finished off the Tamil Tigers? And did the UN know about it? Seems so. The numbers of people killed look to go well beyond the Srebrenica war crime. Critics of such horrors often miss one of the unspoken points about […]
Here is the brilliant Keith Hennessey looking at the sprawling problems of the US motor industry and the Obama Administration’s moves to try to keep General Motors alive, inlcuding praise for parts of the package. A senior American economist told me the other day that the problems of the US auto […]
Michael Yon has built up a great reputation for going to look at tough places under his own steam and reporting on them to an Internet readership. Here he is following a major US diplomatic push in Asia (not something much covered in the UK). US Defence Secretary Gates talks […]
David Hannay (now Baron Hannay of Chiswick) is one of the most brilliant diplomats of my long FCO years. When he was British Ambassador at the UN his telegrams were extraordinary. Any international issue you could think of, summarised in two terse pages, a written combination of analytical insight and operational […]
As the European Parliament elections loom, the sheer horror of the Conservative Party’s idea of leaving the ‘mainstream’ EPP party bloc comes to the fore. I have written about this here. But behold now this onslaught from Tory Grandees, no less. The Independent is scurrying to catch up. The argument […]
Have a look at the excellent analysis by Max Atkinson of Hillary Clinton trying to sound robust while also not being too specific on the subject of how the USA might respond to North Korea. As the video clips show, she is choosing her words so carefully that it all […]
