Clifford D. May

CLIFFORD MAY: Can America change course?

As you watch the circus that is the 2016 presidential campaign, which candidate strikes you as having a coherent vision of national security for the post-Obama era? Who has told you what he (or she) will do about the rise of jihadi regimes and groups in the Middle East and well beyond?

April 12, 2016

CLIFFORD D. MAY: Obama slow to act against terrorism

President Obama's critics charge that he's never developed a strategy to defeat terrorism, the weapon of choice for those waging what they call a global jihad. The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg, the journalist whose ear Mr. Obama most likes to bend, says that's wrong -- that the president does have a strategy. "He is, after all, killing jihadists at a frenetic pace."

April 5, 2016

CLIFFORD MAY: Obama visit legitimizes Cuban dictatorship

''I have come here to bury the last remnant of the Cold War in the Americas." That was Barack Obama's "historic" announcement in Cuba last week. But was it true? What is the Castro regime if not a vestige of communism's 20th century struggle against the capitalist enemy — also known as the Free World? And, self-evidently, President Obama had come not to bury the Castros but to normalize relations with them.

March 29, 2016

CLIFFORD MAY: When universities become day care centers

Back in 1993, Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, a New York Democrat, warned against "defining deviancy down." He was talking specifically about crime, about our getting used to it and not taking serious measures to fight it. But over the years since, is there any realm of American or European life where acceptance of ever-increasing deviancy has not become "the new normal"?

March 22, 2016

CLIFFORD MAY: Obama must acknowledge genocide of Christians in Mideast

In the Yemeni port city of Aden earlier this month, Islamists attacked a Catholic home for the indigent elderly. The militants, believed to be soldiers of the Islamic State, shot the security guard, then entered the facility where they gunned down the old people and their caregivers, including four nuns. At least 16 people were murdered.

March 15, 2016

CLIFFORD D. MAY: Iranian moderates needed to change culture

Elections at the end of February have apparently bolstered the position of President Hassan Rouhani. Though sophisticated and pragmatic, "Rouhani is not a moderate, he is a hard-liner." Those words were recently spoken by Wendy Sherman, former undersecretary of state who served as President Obama's lead negotiator on the Iran nuclear agreement, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.

March 8, 2016

CLIFFORD MAY: How not to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict

Imagine that your mission is to make sure the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians does not get resolved -- not even now, a time when self-proclaimed jihadis are wreaking havoc throughout much of the Middle East and, as a consequence, Israel's relations with Egypt, Jordan and even Saudi Arabia are improving. What policies might help you accomplish your mission?

February 23, 2016

CLIFFORD MAY: U.S. bystanders to genocide

It's surprising how time slips away: Just five years ago next month, President Obama proclaimed a "responsibility to act" when American "interests and values are at stake."

February 16, 2016

CLIFFORD MAY: Winning an unconventional war

War is -- and always will be -- hell. The Law of Armed Conflict is not meant to change that -- only to make it a little less hellish. There are weapons you agree not to use. In exchange, your enemy doesn't use those weapons against you. You treat captured combatants humanely. You expect the same when your soldiers are taken prisoner.

February 9, 2016

CLIFFORD D. MAY: Haute couture headscarves won’t counter violent extremism

In the "culture" section of the venerable Atlantic magazine last month, there was a news item I wouldn't want you to miss: "The Italian fashion house Dolce & Gabbana has just launched a line of hijabs (headscarves) and abayas (cloaks) in the label's signature playful, theatrical aesthetic."

February 2, 2016

CLIFFORD MAY: Skirmishes on the Indian front

DELHI -- What do you make of this month's attacks on Pathankot Air Force Station and Bacha Khan University? My guess is you don't know -- you've heard next to nothing about either.

January 26, 2016

CLIFFORD MAY: The threat to America’s national existence

President Obama judged the Islamic State the "JV team," boasted that he'd set al Qaeda "on its heels" and implemented successful counterterrorism policies in Yemen. He insists that both the nuclear deal and the hostages-for-felons swap he concluded with Iran's rulers are triumphs of diplomacy.

January 19, 2016

CLIFFORD MAY: Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the meaning of Hitler

It's one of those questions political science majors debate over too many beers at the college pub: Which is better, a parliamentary system or a government headed by a powerful chief executive?

January 5, 2016

CLIFFORD MAY: David Cameron questions Muslim Brotherhood’s ideology

Among Western leaders these days, truth-telling is hardly habitual. So I feel compelled to give credit where credit is due: to British Prime Minister David Cameron for speaking frankly about the Muslim Brotherhood.

December 29, 2015

CLIFFORD MAY: The early returns on Obama’s Iran deal

Sen. Bob Corker, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, opened a hearing last week with these candid, if not immortal, words: "I think the agreement is off to a really terrible start."

December 22, 2015

CLIFFORD D. MAY: Perfect submission possible

Michel Houellebecq is a sardonic and iconoclastic French novelist, winner of the prestigious Prix Goncourt, and subject of considerable controversy in Europe these days. He deserves to be controversial here in the United States as well.

December 15, 2015

CLIFFORD MAY: Americans disagree over threats

"Divide and conquer" describes an age-old military concept: If your enemies are fighting among themselves, they can't effectively battle you. Phillip II of Macedon, Julius Caesar and Napoleon were among those who employed this tactic to defeat more powerful forces. Would-be conquerors of the 21st century are lucky: Their enemies can't agree about anything -- not even which barbarians are at the gate.

December 8, 2015

CLIFFORD MAY: Water in Israel

Thirty years ago, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, an Egyptian politician and diplomat who would go on to become United Nations secretary-general in 1992, warned of Middle Eastern wars to come. His prediction was correct, but he was wrong about the cause. What should have worried him was the rise of extremist movements within the Islamic world. What worried him instead was water.

December 1, 2015

CLIFFORD MAY: National security memo to presidential campaign advisers

This memorandum is addressed to the brave souls advising presidential candidates. As you know, the recent terrorist attacks in France -- and in Mali, Nigeria, Cameroon, Egypt, Lebanon, Turkey and Israel -- have altered the political landscape. With less than a year to go before the 2016 election, the landscape may stay altered even if there are no more attacks -- and that seems unlikely.

November 24, 2015

CLIFFORD MAY: Lessons learned from Paris

For almost two generations, since Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution, self-proclaimed jihadis have been fighting to re-establish Islamic supremacy and domination in the world. Leaders of the nations they have been targeting have regarded them as a problem -- but mostly not as dangerous enemies who must be decisively defeated.

November 17, 2015