Early Friday morning, fire-fighting planes and firefighters began pouring in from countries around the world, answering Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s call for help in fighting the largest forest fire it had ever known...The first arrivals were toy-like yellow planes, sent from Greece. They flew low over the Mediterranean, scooping up seawater. Then they moved inland, pouring the water over the flames.

Leaking diplomatic dispatches used to be a recognized diplomatic art. In the not too distant past, American ambassadors in Central America or the Middle East who thought Washington was ignoring their cables would share them with correspondents, knowing that news reports would have a better chance of reaching the secretary of state’s desk than almost any memo the ambassadors wrote themselves.

Amid budget cutbacks and a 'diminishing appetite' for war, Europe has turned increasingly to the 'soft power' assignments like training and institution-building.

Beginning today the capital city plays host to a mega arts fest that brings together exponents from the performing arts, films, poetry, literature and cuisine, all aimed at making Delhi a tourism hub as well as to draw attention to India's soft power through the arts.

Diplomacy is the second oldest legal profession but arguably the least understood. This reality has triggered disparate assessments of the impact of WikiLeaks’ release of thousands of U.S. confidential diplomatic dispatches. The consequences for the conduct of diplomacy are far-reaching and go beyond U.S. fundamental values of freedom of speech and transparency.

During the Cold War — when the U.S. and the Soviet Union raced to find allies — you were viewed as a way to exert soft power and build friendship with countries susceptible to communist influence.

Part I of this series examined the relationships – or lack thereof – between diplomacy, science and international policy, and noted the serious image problems which plague all three enterprises. These difficulties have hobbled the practice of science diplomacy...