HomeFrom the Desk of George Friedman

From the Desk of George Friedman

John F. Kennedy and the Origin of Wars Without End

I’ve spent the past few weeks trying to answer a fundamental question: Why did the United States, economically and militarily the most powerful nation in the world, lose three wars during my lifetime? Given that tomorrow is the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, the immediate cause of the last disastrous war, it is proper that […]

Afghanistan and the 40-Year War

I have to confess that I find it difficult to hold an analytic distance on Afghanistan. I am angry – at no one in...

Facing Reality: China’s Strategy

China is the definition of dynamic. Until the 20th century, the regions of Tibet, Xinjiang, Manchuria and Inner Mongolia were not under the political...

The American Need to be Admired

On a trip to France in 1976, I had a scholar of some repute explain to me how the Vietnam War, having cost Washington...

When You’re Wounded and Left on Afghanistan’s Plains

I was shocked by what happened in Afghanistan in the past week or so. Not because I didn’t expect it – President Joe Biden...

Facing Reality: A New American Strategy

The United States has been at war for almost the entire 21st century, and it’s only 2021. In contrast, the United States was at...

Russian Worries of Collapse

“External threats … are understandable. When we are threatened, we understand who is threatening, what they are threatening , we know what they are...

Why America Loses Wars

The U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan is moving to its inevitable conclusion. The Taliban, the radical Islamists the U.S. was fighting, are taking back control...

‘Is That All There Is?’

There are times in our lives when we are tired – tired in an existential sense, a sense of having seen everything there is...

China and the Element of Surprise

A war between China and the United States would be a war between peer powers. That’s not to say they are identical powers; all...

COVID and Cars

We have moved into the true second phase of the COVID-19 pandemic. Previous phases were merely passing bubbles. This one appears real. Until now,...

The Geopolitics of Heartbreak

The U.S. military presence in Afghanistan is winding down, just as it had in Iraq and Vietnam. There are always those who believe wars...

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