The President’s decision was based on a fundamentally wrong strategic assumption: ISIS is not defeated and still has a significant presence in Syria and Iraq.

Ambassador Abizaid may well be the right man for the worst time, and may still be able to heal a strategic partnership at a critical time.

The U.S. cannot ignore the need to deal with the facts of the Khashoggi murder, but the last few weeks have been a warning of a far broader problem. 

At this point, there is no way to avoid a long and painful effort to determine all the facts surrounding Khashoggi's death and establish the level of responsibility for all of the Saudis involved.

A spasm of reporting on Khashoggi, and a flood of OP-EDs dumping on Saudi Arabia – followed by a lack of in depth coverage of the problem – is no memorial to someone who seems to have died for trying to speak the truth.

It is always hard to separate strategic posturing from strategic reality, but the last year has seen a steady deterioration in U.S. and Chinese relations. 

The U.S. State Department issued its latest annual report on terrorism on August 19, 2018. The report updates its past estimates to cover 2017 and provides a separate Annex of Statistical Information that summarizes the global trends in terrorism.

Iraq is a major oil power, a critical buffer against Iran, and a far more dangerous source of future conflicts that can directly threaten key U.S. strategic interests.

The new Administration seems to have accepted the legacy of the previous Administration by largely abandoning the civil side of each war. It is dealing with major insurgencies and civil war as if they were limited terrorist movements. 

Not without cause, the furor over President Trump's meeting with Putin has focused on Russia. The fact remains, however, that the NATO Summit meeting and its aftermath may well have been equally, or more, destructive to the security interests of the U.S. and its allies. The...