Links to Recent Articles of Interest
By Anatol Lieven, Responsible Statecraft, posted February 22
Argues that there is still room to avert a full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine and that it is right to withhold the heaviest potential sanctions for such an eventuality. “If we impose full sanctions now, we will have no more economic ammunition to use, and Russia would have nothing to lose by widening the war.” The author is a senior research fellow of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.
By Bruce W. Dearstyne, History News Network, posted February 20
On accusations in the 1920s that history textbooks were insufficiently patriotic, especially in depicting the American Revolution. Historians, especially the American Historical Association, pushed back against the attacks, and the controversy died down by later in the decade. The author is a historian in Albany, NY.
By Elise Lemire, History News Network, posted February 20
“... Mr. Arbery was caught at the intersection of a set of White beliefs that crystalized between the American Revolution and the Civil War, when descriptions and pictorial representations of Blacks romantically and sexually coupling with Whites proliferated in the United States.” The author teaches literature at Purchase College and is the author of “Miscegenation”: Making Race in America (U. of Pennsylvania Press, 2002).
By Jack F. Matlock Jr., Responsible Statecraft, posted February 15
“After the fall of the Soviet Union, I told the Senate that expansion [of NATO] would lead us to where we are today.” The author is a former career forieign service officer who served as US ambassador to the Soviet Union from 1987 to 1991. He is on the board of directors of the American Committee for US-Russia Accord, which published a lengthier version of this article.
By Rajan Menon, TomDispatch.com, posted February 8
“Instead of seizing the opportunity to create a new European order that included Russia, President Bill Clinton and his foreign-policy team squandered it by deciding to expand NATO threateningly toward that country’s borders.” The author is a professor emeritus of international relations at Columbia University.
By Lawrence Wittner, Common Dreams, posted February 7
” Kennedy and Khrushchev recognized, to their mutual dismay, that their two nuclear-armed nations had arrived at an incredibly dangerous impasse and were sliding toward nuclear war. As a result, they did some top-secret bargaining that de-escalated the situation.” The author is a professor emeritus of history at SUNY Albany.
By Robert Cohen, Washington Post, posted February 3
Uses reflective essays from 1962 by white students at the University of Georgia to decry the results of an education that ignores the role that race has played in US society. The author teaches history and social studies education at New York University.
By Lawrence Davidson, CounterPunch.org, posted February 3
Argues that the historical term “pogrom” applies to the use of violence against Palestinians in the West Bank by settlers with tacit encouragement from the Israeli government. The author is a retired professor of history at West Chester University in Pennsylvania.
By Andrew J Bacevich, Commonweal, posted February 2
Recalls lessons from David Halberstam's account of US commitment to the Vietnam War, The Best and the Brightest, published 50 years ago this year, to warn against a similar overcommitment in Eastern Europe. The alternative approach is what the author calls moral realism. Is is a retired US Army colonel and a professor emeritus of history and international relations at Boston University.
By Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies Countercurrents.org, posted January 31
A counter-narrative of US actions in recent years, starting with involvement in the overthrow of a Russia-friendly government of Ukraine in 2014. Medea Benjamin is a co-founder of Global Exchange and CODEPINK; Nicolas Davies is author of Blood on Our Hands: The American Invasion and Destruction of Iraq.
Thanks to Rusti Eisenberg and an anonymous reader for flagging some of the above articles, and to Steve Gosch for valuable consulting. Suggestions for future lists can be sent to jimobrien48@gmail.com.