Diplomacy & Politics Archive

What do the Iran nuclear deal, U.S. trade policy and North Korea summits all have in common? The answer is a persistent feature of U.S. foreign policy under President Donald Trump: uncertainty. Trump’s election in November 2016 brought more questions than answers about the future of American foreign policy. Would Trump follow through on his most provocative and incendiary campaign promises and threats, or use them as leverage to win concessions? Would he radically and durably reconfigure America’s global role, or find himself hemmed in by the inertial constraints of the international order? What is so striking, and what the […]

BUENOS AIRES—Last October, Argentine President Mauricio Macri celebrated the triumph of his Cambiemos, or “Let’s Change,” coalition in midterm legislative elections. For Macri, the victory represented a much-needed public endorsement of his agenda of incremental economic reforms, known as “gradualismo.” Looking at the midterm results, some analysts and politicians practically guaranteed that Macri would be re-elected in 2019. In Argentina, however, a few months can be an eternity, and Macri is now facing a string of bad economic news, which has increased popular discontent and fired up a resurgent opposition. Macri won the 2015 presidential elections by promising that his […]

In recent days, the war in Yemen has worsened, with Saudi-led coalition airstrikes that killed the political leader of the Houthi rebel movement, Saleh al-Sammad, on April 19, and over 50 Houthi militants, including two senior commanders, on April 27. How Yemen’s Houthis respond to the attacks will determine the course of the war in the coming months. But any hopes for movement toward a political solution appear to be dashed, despite quiet efforts by Oman to bring the parties together, and public admonitions by U.S. officials to their Saudi counterparts to focus on bringing this tragic war to an […]

WARSAW—On April 19, the Polish capital paused to remember the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943, when Jews took up arms against the Nazi Germans. The 75th anniversary of the start of the uprising was observed in ceremonies led by Jewish leaders as well as officials from the highest levels of government. At one event held at the city’s Monument to the Warsaw Ghetto Heroes, addressing a crowd that included Holocaust survivors, President Andrzej Duda hailed those who rose up to resist the Nazi occupiers. “We bow our heads low to their heroism, their bravery, their determination and courage,” he said. […]

Last Friday’s historic meeting between South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, the first inter-Korean summit in over a decade and only the third since the nation was divided after World War II, was arguably long on symbolism and short on substance. But the symbolism was extraordinary. Kim came to the meeting across the heavily fortified boundary dividing the Korean Peninsula, the first North Korean leader to set foot in the South. He and Moon shook hands at the concrete curb that marked the boundary, and—in an apparently unscripted moment—Kim took Moon’s hand and the […]