The failure of the U.S. campaign to dissuade allies from joining China’s Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank was greeted in some quarters as a sign of American decline. But this episode was not a crisis of American power, which remains unequaled. And while the threat that the bank poses to that power and to the international order it undergirds has been much touted, it is in fact overstated. In fact, the main portent of the episode is not Beijing’s overturning of the international economic order or the arrival of China as a U.S.

Robert Pszczel said he felt like he was in a Monty Python skit when he made a routine call to Russia's Defense Ministry back in June 2013."We cannot talk to you!" came the agitated reply in a hissed whisper, says Pszczel, acting out the scene for comic effect.This was how Pszczel, NATO's envoy in Russia, found out his line of contact with the ministry had been terminated.(...)Pszczel says incidents like this have been business as usual at the NATO outpost he runs in Moscow.

Our diplomacy must be more nimble–setting priorities, forming coalitions around shared values and interests, and working assiduously to maintain the broad appeal of the international order. 

The selection of a gown for a state dinner is always a matter of sartorial politics, cultural exchange and U.S. Chamber of Commerce-style marketing... It was also a beautiful example of fashion diplomacy.

In the unfolding reinvention of the U.S.-Cuban relationship, health appears as a sector with special promise for cooperation, particularly well-positioned to be the front edge of an opening with Cuba. Normalization of relations has the potential for fruitful, enlarged engagement in four key health-related areas that can bring mutual gain in improving lives and advancing knowledge.

The United States has been privately leaning on France and other allies to hold off on pushing a measure at the U.N. Security Council that is designed to force movement on the stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace process at least until negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program have concluded, diplomats told Foreign Policy.

Ambreen Butt has always made political art. Early in her career, the Pakistani-born artist now based in the Boston area investigated the tug of two cultures in mixed-media paintings and drawings. (...) Her current installation at Carroll and Sons, “I Am All What Is Left of Me,” was inspired by a commission from the State Department’s Art in Embassies program for the new US Embassy in Islamabad.

The White House is keen to capitalize on Abe`s desire to put Japan back at the center of power in Asia, as China flexes its political and economic muscle. In the Oval Office Obama and Abe will discuss trade and are expected to hail progress toward a Trans-Pacific Partnership that brings together 12 countries -- including Japan and the United States.