General Failure: How the U.S. Military Lied About the 9/11 Wars

The Intercept
September 8, 2011

Pretty much every day since 9/11, the U.S. military has disciplined soldiers who failed to do their jobs properly. They have been punished for minor offenses, like being late for duty, and for serious crimes, such as murder or assault. Since 2001, there have been more ...  (Read more)

Trump Built His Own Green Zone. He Got the Wall He Deserves.

The Intercept
June 5, 2020

An array of what might be described as the accessories and devices of dictatorship have expanded with infectious ruthlessness in American cities. The police swinging batons wildly, the paramilitary forces refusing to identify themselves, the hysterical president trying to ...  (Read more)

Max Boot Is Very Sorry for Backing the GOP and the Iraq Invasion. Why Is He Being Praised for This?

The Intercept
October 13, 2018

THERE IS AN unforgettable passage in Graham Greene’s classic “The Quiet American” in which the title character, a CIA agent named Alden Pyle, admits that Vietnam is much more complicated than he’d imagined. “I had not realized how tribal politics was and how ...  (Read more)

America’s War Narrative Focuses on Its Soldiers. Afghans and Iraqis Are Brushed Aside

The Intercept
September 2, 2018

The young newspaper reporter wanted to write a book about the war he was covering. But the editors who read his proposal turned it down, all of them. They said the book wouldn’t sell because Americans were tired of reading about these violent foreigners and their centuries-old ...  (Read more)

Donald Trump Has Liberated Koreans From the Illusion That America Is Helping Them

The Intercept
May 25, 2018

It’s strange to say, but there is an upside to the goat rodeo way in which President Donald Trump has cancelled, for the moment, his North Korea summit. No president has done a better job of making clear that the United States is an impediment to peace on the Korean ...  (Read more)

It’s Time to Wage War Against War Movies That Glorify Outdated Models of Masculinity

The Intercept
January 27, 2018

The Hollywood Reporter published a surprising story earlier this month about film studios turning away from movies about sex. A biopic about Hugh Hefner is stalled, gone for the moment is a James Franco film about a 15-year-old Russian prostitute, and a remake of “A ...  (Read more)

Brad Pitt’s “War Machine” Offers an Absurd and Scathing Critique of America’s Generals

The Intercept
June 17, 2017

How do military leaders persuade their soldiers to fight an insane war?

Here’s one way. The setting is a bitter outpost of the American war in Afghanistan. The years-long nightmare has no prospect of ending so long as American troops stay in a country that has a nearly unblemished ...  (Read more)