Military Archives - Public Seminar

Economy

Panama Against Trump

A country’s fate hangs in the balance as protestors take to the streets

October 13, 2025 • by Nolan Young

As Donald Trump prepared to take office in late 2024, the American president-elect issued a stunning threat: to “take back” the Panama Canal, almost a quarter century after the United States had returned control of the canal and the zone around it to the sovereign state of Panama. Once in office, ...

Uncategorized

Why Does a Powerful Nation Form an Alliance with a Minor Power?

The India-Armenia arms deal opens a window on the value of asymmetrical alliances

February 14, 2023 • by Georgi Asatryan

India-Armenia relations have been actively developing in recent years. In a series of consultations and meetings, India and Armenia have signed defense deals, a significant development in the global arms trade. For India, a great power, this was the first export deal of its weapons, while Armenia, a minor power, ...

Why Does a Powerful Nation Form an Alliance with a Minor Power?

Europe & Central Asia

Might the U.S. Military Support Nuclear Disarmament?

Its senior leadership is uniquely positioned in the present moment to pursue a revolutionary possibility

October 24, 2022 • by Robert Edwards

It is often difficult in the moment to recognize when one is at a crossroads. In the 1991 Gulf War, I was a lowly tactical intelligence officer in a parachute infantry regiment of the 82nd Airborne, rolling through the Iraqi desert beneath an air campaign that left smoldering charcoal where ...

Might the U.S. Military Support Nuclear Disarmament?

War

Personal Reflections on War and Peace

A response to James Carroll

October 24, 2022 • by Frida Berrigan

The history of nonviolent successes is underreported, understudied, and under-understood. ...

Europe & Central Asia

Part 1: A Just War?

Revelations of the War in Ukraine: An anti-war activist’s personal and political reckoning

September 7, 2022 • by James Carroll

In nations bracketing the North Atlantic a great sigh of relief could almost be heard: how great to be free once more to demonize Moscow....

Europe & Central Asia

An Open Letter by Russian Scientists and Science Journalists Against the War with Ukraine

The war against Ukraine is unjust and senseless

March 7, 2022 • by Russian Scientists

The isolation of Russia from the world amounts to a continued cultural and technological degradation of our country, with a complete lack of positive perspectives in view. The war with Ukraine is a step into nowhere....

An Open Letter by Russian Scientists and Science Journalists Against the War with Ukraine

Democracy

The Blob and the Mob: On Grand Strategy and Social Change

In an excerpt from Rethinking American Grand Strategy, Beverly Gage examines how statecraft and social movements intersect

December 8, 2021 • by Beverly Gage

Means and Ends As other essays in this collection demonstrate, the idea of “grand strategy” emerged out of the world of military affairs. Under the famous rubric identified by British historian B. H. Liddell Hart, “strategy” was what generals did, while “grand strategy” fell to politicians and statesmen, charged not only with winning ...

The Blob and the Mob: On Grand Strategy and Social Change

Uncategorized

Drone Strikes and Civilian Casualties

Will admitting a “tragic mistake” change the way we wage war?

September 21, 2021 • by Heather Cox Richardson

Last Friday, Marine Corps General Frank McKenzie of U.S. Central Command admitted that the August 29 drone strike in Kabul, Afghanistan, that the U.S. had claimed hit ISIS-K fighters had instead killed 10 civilians, including seven children. This “tragic mistake,” as he called it, at the very end of the ...

Politics

Instead of Focusing on Russian Bounties to the Taliban, Why Doesn’t the U.S. End the Afghan War?

Lawmakers are outraged over a recent story alleging that Vladimir Putin may be paying off Taliban soldiers to kill U.S. troops. But why are those troops still in Afghanistan?

July 14, 2020 • by Sonali Kolhatkar

Unfortunately, this crucial point has been lost amidst the frenzied responses to the story about Russian bounties. Instead, the revelations have fed the tempting narrative that Trump is a stooge of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Republican Senator Mitt Romney of Utah -- who is now apparently a stalwart of the ...

Race

Why Are American Military Bases Still Named After Confederate Soldiers?

In failing to realize that individuals are the sum of their actions — all of their actions — the Army is perpetuating hate, subjugation, and inequality.

July 10, 2019 • by Troy Mosley

The great irony is that many of these lieutenants will serve at bases named after Confederate leaders. As of this writing, there are 10 bases on American soil named in honor of men who betrayed their oath to protect the United States Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic — ...

Europe & Central Asia

From Casting Director to Failed Coup

Unseating the Turkish military

March 6, 2018 • by Phyllis Jeffrey

The most recent period of competitive democratic politics in Turkey was bookended by two coups: those of 1980 and 2016. If the first heralded the re-organization of politics under the supervision of the military, the second instigated the transition to a civilian autocracy. The significance of the failed coup of ...

Military

Panama Against Trump

A country’s fate hangs in the balance as protestors take to the streets

Why Does a Powerful Nation Form an Alliance with a Minor Power?

The India-Armenia arms deal opens a window on the value of asymmetrical alliances

Might the U.S. Military Support Nuclear Disarmament?

Its senior leadership is uniquely positioned in the present moment to pursue a revolutionary possibility

Personal Reflections on War and Peace

A response to James Carroll

Part 1: A Just War?

Revelations of the War in Ukraine: An anti-war activist’s personal and political reckoning

An Open Letter by Russian Scientists and Science Journalists Against the War with Ukraine

The war against Ukraine is unjust and senseless

Drone Strikes and Civilian Casualties

Will admitting a “tragic mistake” change the way we wage war?

Instead of Focusing on Russian Bounties to the Taliban, Why Doesn’t the U.S. End the Afghan War?

Lawmakers are outraged over a recent story alleging that Vladimir Putin may be paying off Taliban soldiers to kill U.S. troops. But why are those troops still in Afghanistan?

Why Are American Military Bases Still Named After Confederate Soldiers?

In failing to realize that individuals are the sum of their actions — all of their actions — the Army is perpetuating hate, subjugation, and inequality.

From Casting Director to Failed Coup

Unseating the Turkish military

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