Author: Patrick J. Buchanan

Thousands of U.S. troops safeguard the border of South Korea. U.S. warships patrol the South China Sea to stand witness to the territorial claims of Asian allies against China. U.S. troops move in and out of the Baltic States to signal our willingness to defend the frontiers of these tiny NATO allies. Yet nothing that happens on these borders imperils America so much as what is happening on our own bleeding border with Mexico. Over three decades, that border has been a causeway into the USA for millions of illegal immigrants who are changing the face of America — to … Continue reading →

Half a century ago this summer, the Voting Rights Act was passed, propelled by Bloody Sunday at Selma Bridge. The previous summer, the Civil Rights Act became law on July 2. We are in the 7th year of the presidency of a black American who has named the first two black U.S. attorneys general. Yet race relations seem more poisonous now than then, when the good will of America’s majority was driving legislation. Today’s issue, however, is not voting rights, open housing or school busing. It is black vs. blue: African-Americans inflamed at what they see as chronic police brutality … Continue reading →

Toward the end of the presidency of George H.W. Bush, America stood alone at the top of the world — the sole superpower. After five weeks of “shock and awe” and 100 hours of combat, Saddam’s army had fled Kuwait back up the road to Basra and Bagdad. Our Cold War adversary was breaking apart into 15 countries. The Berlin Wall had fallen. Germany was reunited. The captive nations of Central and Eastern Europe were breaking free. Bush I had mended fences with Beijing after the 1989 massacre in Tiananmen Square. Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin were friends. The president … Continue reading →

“What apparently happened was that the Iraqi forces just showed no will to fight. … We can give them training, we can give them equipment; we obviously can’t give them the will to fight.” Thus did Defense Secretary Ash Carter identify the root cause of the rout of the Iraqi army in Ramadi. Disgusted U.S. military officers say the 1,000 ISIS fighters who overran Ramadi were outnumbered by the defenders 10 to 1. Why did the Iraqi army run? And what motivated the fighters of ISIS to attack a city whose defenders so vastly outnumbered them? According to battle reports, … Continue reading →

The fall of Ramadi, capital of Anbar, largest province in Iraq, after a rout of the Iraqi army by a few hundred ISIS fighters using bomb-laden trucks, represents a stunning setback for U.S. policy. When President Obama declared that we shall “degrade and defeat” the Islamic State, he willed the ends, but not the means. The retreat from Ramadi makes clear that the Iraqi army, even backed by 3,000 U.S. troops, cannot drive ISIS out of Anbar and Mosul and back into Syria. Baghdad cannot alone reunite Iraq. Republicans are almost gleeful in charging that Obama’s withdrawal of U.S. forces … Continue reading →

Jeb Bush has spent the week debating with himself over whether he would have started the war his brother launched on Iraq. When he figures it out, hopefully, our would-be president will focus in on the campaign to drag us into yet another Mideast war — this time to bring down Bashar Assad’s regime in Syria. While few would mourn the passing of the Assad dynasty, there is a problem: If Assad falls, a slaughter of Christians will follow and the battle for control of Damascus will be between the Syrian branch of al-Qaida, the Nusra Front, and the crazed … Continue reading →

David Cameron is the most successful Tory Party leader since Margaret Thatcher. Yet history may also record that his success led to the crackup of his country, and Great Britain’s secession from the European Union. How did Cameron’s Tories capture their majority? First, they compiled a strong record to run on. More critically, they attacked the Labour Party of Ed Miliband as too far left to govern, and warned that a Labour government would be hostage to a secessionist Scottish National Party, without whose votes Miliband could never reach a majority in Parliament. Labour could not shake off the charge, … Continue reading →

For a month now, the Saudi air force has been bombing Yemen to reverse a takeover of that nation of 25 million by Houthi rebels, and reinstall a president who fled his country and is residing in Riyadh. The Saudis have hit airfields, armor and arms depots, and caused a humanitarian catastrophe. Nearly 1,000 dead, 3,500 wounded and tens of thousands homeless. The poorest nation in the Arab world is near collapse. Dependent upon imported food, Yemen faces malnutrition and starvation. And the United States has been an accomplice in the Saudi bombing of Yemen. Why? Why is Yemen’s civil … Continue reading →

“Could a U.S. response to Russia’s action in Ukraine provoke a confrontation that leads to a U.S.-Russia War?” This jolting question is raised by Graham Allison and Dimitri Simes in the cover article of The National Interest. The answer the authors give, in “Countdown to War: The Coming U.S. Russia Conflict,” is that the odds are shortening on a military collision between the world’s largest nuclear powers. The cockpit of the conflict, should it come, will be Ukraine. What makes the article timely is the report that Canada will be sending 200 soldiers to western Ukraine to join 800 Americans … Continue reading →

At the Summit of the Americas where he met with Raul Castro, the 83-year-old younger brother of Fidel, President Obama provided an insight into where he is taking us, and why: “The United States will not be imprisoned by the past — we’re looking to the future. I’m not interested in having battles that frankly started before I was born.” Obama was not yet born when Fidel rolled into Havana, Jan. 1, 1959. He was 1 year old during the missile crisis. His mother belonged to a 1960s generation that welcomed the Cuban Revolution. His father came from an African … Continue reading →

A voracious and eclectic reader, President Nixon instructed me to send him every few weeks 10 articles he would not normally see that were on interesting or important issues. In 1971, I sent him an essay from The Atlantic, with reviews by Time and Newsweek, by Dr. Richard Herrnstein. My summary read: “Basically, (Herrnstein) demonstrates that heredity, rather than environment, determines intelligence — and that the more we proceed to provide everyone with a ‘good environment’ the more heredity will become the dominant factor … in their success and social standing.” In a 1994 obituary, The New York Times wrote … Continue reading →

The forces that do not want a U.S. nuclear deal with Iran, nor any U.S. detente with Iran, are impressive. Among them are the Israelis and their powerful lobby AIPAC, the Saudis and their Sunni allies on the Persian Gulf, a near unanimity of Republicans and a plurality of Democrats in Congress. Is there a case to be made for a truce in the venomous conflict that has gone on between us since the taking of U.S. hostages in 1979? Is there any common ground? To both questions, President Obama and John Kerry believe the answer is yes. And they … Continue reading →

In November 1956, President Eisenhower, enraged he had not been forewarned of their invasion of Egypt, ordered the British, French and Israelis to get out of Suez and Sinai. They did as told. How far we have fallen from the America of Ike and John Foster Dulles has been on painful display this March. An Israeli leader told a joint session of Congress that President Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran is stupid and dangerous and must be rejected. Congress gave him 40 ovations. Bibi Netanyahu then went home and told the world there will be no Palestinian state, and was … Continue reading →

With Hillary Clinton scrambling to explain her missing emails, much of America is wailing, “Please don’t make us watch this movie again!” Why, then, would the Republican Party, with a chance to sweep it all in 2016, want to return us to the nightmare days of George W., which caused America to rise up and throw the party out in 2006 and 2008? Do Republicans really believe that America wants a return to the Cold War with Moscow and new and larger hot wars in the Middle East? With President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry seemingly about … Continue reading →

As the European Coal and Steel Community of Jean Monnet evolved into the EU, we were told a “United States of Europe” was at hand, modeled on the USA. And other countries and continents will inevitably follow Europe’s example. There will be a North American Union of the U.S., Canada and Mexico, and a Latin America Union of the Mercosur trade partnership. In an essay, “The E.U. Experiment Has Failed,” Bruce Thornton of Hoover Institution makes the case that the verdict is in, the dream is dead, the EU is unraveling, One Europe is finished. Consider, first, economics. In 2013, … Continue reading →