But no one, no matter how brilliant, can achieve the impossible. And the problem in Afghanistan is the impossibility of the mission. The United States is pursuing a nation-building strategy with counterinsurgency tactics – that is, building a nation at the barrel end of a gun.

Randall Lane's new book, "The Zeroes," details one of the stupidest moments in the recent history of America's efforts to engage the Arab world. Lane, a magazine industry genius, was hired to turn out a glossy magazine that would show Muslims images of the real America. Except that the real America, the Bush State Department mandated, contained no donkeys...

“Soft power” challenged Korea’s traditional development paradigm. From the 1960s, authoritarian governments had placed absolute primacy on economic growth. Social and political development was de-prioritized as the entire nation was hitched to an economic locomotive that would convey Korea to the terminus of “advanced nations.”

The 27-nation European Union (EU) has provided the landlocked country in the southern part of the continent of Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo rivers, 180 million Euros for health, education, food security and governance.

In a far-reaching restatement of goals for the nation’s space agency, NASA administrator Charles Bolden says President Obama has ordered him to pursue three new objectives: to “re-inspire children” to study science and math, to “expand our international relationships,” and to “reach out to the Muslim world.”

Israel is failing to win US public opinion in the wake of its assault on the Gaza aid flotilla that left nine activists dead, according to a leaked memo by Republican political consultant Frank Lunz.

Canadians have much to be grateful for, including little attention from the US... Unlike America’s border with its southern neighbor, the border with its northern neighbor is calm and orderly.

Turkey is acting with a new level of self-confidence in the international diplomatic arena, and no one should resent the country for trying to build up its status as a regional power - or for trying to look beyond the narrow confines of Europe.