North America Archive

BOGOTÁ, Colombia — Ever since Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez stepped in to act as a mediator between rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the Colombian government, hopes have been raised about the possibility of brokering a deal to secure the release of high-profile hostages held by the guerrilla group. But difficult obstacles to an agreement remain. Chavez’s active role has been enthusiastically welcomed by the international community, the Colombian government and by the FARC. “President Chávez’s . . . ability, his shrewdness, and the prestige he has gained on the continent will help to resolve the […]

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization last week announced that it is contemplating scaling back its highly publicized NATO Response Force, the Alliance’s rapid reaction military force and its catalyst for military transformation. As is often the case for NATO, the real world intruded on its military ambitions. “There is an examination underway” within NATO to see how to sustain the response force, which requires a steady state of 25,000 troops trained and ready to deploy, said spokesman James Appathurai at a press briefing in Brussels. “We could have an NRF that is not always at 25,000” he postulated, “rather than […]

AT THE UNITED NATIONS, NEW YORK — The fanfare that opens the U.N. General Assembly’s annual session is played on the sirens of New York police cars trying to clear a path through Manhattan traffic for the motorcades of visiting world leaders. New Yorkers are resigned to this autumnal ritual that causes midtown streets to be closed and fills the city’s hotels to capacity — at prices inflated for the occasion. The Waldorf Astoria Hotel, where President Bush overnighted Monday while in town to deliver the inaugural address the following morning became a fortress, surrounded by hundreds of New York’s […]

For approximately 36 hours last month, the U.S. Air Force lost track of half a dozen nuclear weapons. Although Air Force leaders characterize the event as a unique occurrence, the incident will likely encourage opposition to the Bush administration’s Prompt Global Strike plan, which aims give the United States the option of using nuclear and non-nuclear weapons on the same delivery systems. On Aug. 30, the crew of an Air Force B-52H Stratofortress unknowingly carried six nuclear-tipped AGM-129 cruise missiles while flying from Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota to Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana. Throughout the three-and-a-half-hour […]

The Iraqi armed forces are struggling to become self-sufficient in the face of constant insurgent attacks, a dearth of experienced leaders and in a divisive political environment. Several years after the establishment of Baghdad’s new army and air force, U.S. and British forces still take the lead in most combat operations in Iraq. But in two key areas — armored trucks and counterinsurgency aircraft — the Iraqi military is actually more advanced than its American partner, reflecting key differences in the two nations’ overall military strategies. Armored Trucks In April 2006, the U.S. Department of Defense solicited bids from American […]

MEMORIES AND MEMOIRS — At a farewell dinner for departing British ambassador Sir David Manning in Washington Friday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice warmly recalled how she and Manning had worked together during the Iraq war: Rice as national security adviser to President Bush, and the ambassador as her counterpart at 10 Downing Street. But this harmonious picture doesn’t quite match the one Manning painted in the New Statesman magazine, claiming that the Bush administration sometimes failed to inform Prime Minister Tony Blair of key decisions on Iraq, or failed to take into account British objections. For example, Manning insists […]

MEXICO CITY — For decades, the Mexican president’s annual Sept. 1 national address was an extravagant bit of political pageantry. The chief executive would kick off the event by touring the capital’s streets in a convertible, waving to adoring crowds under a shower of confetti. Then, he would strut into Congress and speak at length, sometimes for hours, on his administration’s achievements of that year. Today, the event remains a prime example of Mexican political theater, but with an important distinction — with the advent of democracy, the proceedings are now unscripted and occasionally unruly. In 2006, former President Vicente […]

At the end of August, U.S. Sen. Richard Lugar and former Sen. Sam Nunn visited Russia to reinvigorate the pioneering U.S.-funded Comprehensive Threat Reduction Program (CTR) they helped launch a decade-and-a-half ago. The CTR program, widely known as the Nunn-Lugar Program, aims to secure and eliminate the weapons of mass destruction the new Russian Federation inherited from the Soviet Union following the U.S.S.R.’s demise in 1991. On Aug. 30, the two senators visited the chemical weapons destruction facility that the United States and other foreign governments — most notably Britain, Canada, the Czech Republic, Italy, Norway and Switzerland — are […]

PARIS — There has been much talk of late of impending “changes” in French foreign policy. New French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s programmatic speech last month on foreign policy matters — and especially his remarks on the “unacceptability” of an Iran armed with nuclear weapons — first spurred such discussions. Then came the publication last week of former French Foreign Minister Hubert Védrine’s commissioned report to the French President on globalization and French foreign policy. Védrine, a Socialist, served as Foreign Minister from 1997-2002 in the government of Lionel Jospin, in which capacity he famously qualified American counter-terrorism efforts in the […]

HALIFAX, Nova Scotia — Lust for oil can overpower a country’s democratic ideals and common sense, and the United States is not immune. Consider Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice’s rhetorical embrace of Equatorial Guinea’s president, Teodoro Obiang Nguema, in April 2006. “You are a good friend and we welcome you,” she said. Two years earlier, the U.S. Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations disclosed how Rice’s “good friend” and his family held multimillion dollar accounts, gleaned from government revenue, in Riggs Bank, which was eventually convicted of violating America’s Bank Secrecy Act. When not ripping off the state treasury, Obiang has […]

WASHINGTON — In early August, Seattle-based Boeing, the nation’s second-largest weapons manufacturer, extended invitations to several East Coast-based online journalists to ride on a lavish Boeing corporate jet to Everett, Wash., to tour the company’s 767 airplane factory. Boeing’s aim: to win some good-will from a relatively neglected slice of the media as the company vies for one of the biggest and most important military contracts in decades. In coming months, perhaps as early as December, the U.S. Air Force will decide between Boeing and a partnership of Los Angeles-based Northrop Grumman and the European firm EADS for a $40-billion […]

For decades during the Cold War, the United States sought nuclear primacy. Now it may be on the verge of achieving it. As America’s presidential candidates begin to articulate positions on nuclear policy, it is worth remembering that in all dealings with the nuclear genie, you should be careful what you wish for. . . . When a state can obliterate its adversary’s arsenal with a first strike, it is said to possess nuclear primacy. America had primacy early in the Cold War, but the Soviet Union’s acquisition of a secure second strike capability in the 1960s ushered in the […]

Rumors that Fidel Castro is dead are again electrifying gossip circuits on the streets of Havana, at the favored hangouts of Cuban exiles along Miami’s Calle Ocho, and in some corners of the blogosphere. The Cuban President, who handed power “temporarily” to his brother Raúl more than a year ago, has not appeared in a new video or photograph in almost three months. But Fidel maintains a presence in print, regularly publishing lengthy disquisitions about wide ranging subjects. His most recent, an analysis of presidential politics in the United States, brought back memories of the last time I saw the […]