David Ignatius
Thanksgiving is America's favorite holiday because it's a time when we put aside our cares, much as the struggling Pilgrims did nearly four centuries ago, and eat a gut-busting meal without worrying about the 'out years.'Collection: Thanksgiving
If you walk into the front hallway of the CIA, you will see, on your left, a statue of William 'Wild Bill' Donovan. Bill Donovan was the person who created the OSS, the Office of Strategic Services, which was America's spy agency during World War II and then kind of morphed into what's now the CIA.Collection: War
During an economic crisis, what matters is that the government keeps its foot on the accelerator.Collection: Government
2011 was a year in which events rarely turned out as predicted, and when much of the world seemed shrouded in turmoil and uncertainty. It was difficult for government analysts back in Washington to know just where they were on the map, let alone where they were heading.Collection: Government
Sometimes James Bond movies drive me crazy. They're fun to watch, but they don't have anything to do at all with what intelligence officers really do.Collection: Movies
Fear brings out the best in some people and the worst in others. It's a test of character, for individuals and nations.Collection: Fear
Self-proclaimed saviors and other outliers come and go throughout our political history. Occasionally, they're successful; most times, they're not. But the system has rebalanced toward the basic principles of tolerance, freedom and democracy that were set forth by the Founders.
Making economic policy isn't a popularity contest, especially when financial markets are in a panic.
At the center of President Obama's strategy for dealing with the Islamic State is an empty space. It's supposed be filled by a 'Sunni ground force,' but after more than a year of effort, it's still not there. Unless this gap is filled, Obama's plan won't work.
Saudi Arabia is a frightened monarchy. It's beset by Sunni extremists from the Islamic State and Shiite extremists backed by Iran.
Middle Eastern wars rarely end with outright victory and permanent stability, so the word 'settlement' may promise too much. At best, for many years, it may simply mean stable ceasefire lines, reduced bloodshed, fewer refugees, and less terrorism.
Machiavelli did believe that it was better to appear to be good than to be good. If you're good, you're just too vulnerable, but if you appear to be good, you get all the benefits plus you can be sneaky and, when necessary, stab someone in the back.
A disaffected America can be drawn into a civilized - but disruptive - dialogue about political change and reformation.
Bob Gates has unusual standing in the debate about the Obama administration's foreign policy: He was defense secretary for both a hawkish President George W. Bush and a wary President Obama. He understood Bush's desire to project power and Obama's skepticism.
The secret of any kind of reporting is to go with a guide. So if you, you're going to see Hezbollah in Beirut, you go with someone who knows the local people, and you'll be fine.
A world in which there are no secrets that can be protected at all is going to be a pretty dangerous world.
The truth is, as you know, people like us look at what's happening in the world, and then we project it forward. We think, 'If I know A and B, then I've got to know that C and D are coming,' and that's kind of the way it's been with my fiction.
The CIA in real life, we know, is looking for new kinds of cover. It's looking for new platforms, as they like to say, and it's trying to use the revolution in communications technology, the ability to use all sorts of corporate entities in ways that are hard to detect to get our spies in the places where they need to be.
The world has changed, the CIA is having to change, and again, the challenge for someone like me as a spy novelist is to write realistically about where they're actually going.
I began writing fiction because it was the only way to tell all the intricacies of a real-life spy story.
As so many writers know, the experience of creating an imaginary world is closer to dreaming than it is to normal, grit-your-teeth work. It's preconscious rather than conscious. Ideas fall into your head, and the book writes you, rather than the other way around.
This experience of getting so lost in my writing that I lose track of time, or of anything outside the imagined world, is a release for me.
Empty political space will be filled by extremists unless the United States and its allies build strong local forces that can suppress terrorist groups and warlords both. When the U.S. creates such local forces, it must be persistent. If it withdraws from these efforts, as America did in Iraq in 2011, it invites mayhem.
Intelligence services exist to do things that are illegal abroad. They exist to tell lies.
I've tried, in 'Bloodmoney,' to tell a story that gets at the crazy relationship between the ISI and the CIA, these absolutely fascinating, often mutually destructive two scorpions in a bottle kind of relationship that they have.
The ISI is above all a paramilitary organization. It doesn't do all that much collection of intelligence. It's not a very good spy agency, but it's good at running covert action.
We have a complicated intelligence relationship with France. We have a complicated intelligence relationship with other - with other allies.
Russia is emerging as an essential diplomatic and security partner for the U.S. in Syria, despite the Obama administration's opposition to Moscow's support for President Bashar al-Assad.
Moscow and Washington have evolved a delicate process for 'de-confliction' in the tight Syrian airspace, where accidents or miscommunication could be disastrous.
Enter the candidates on horseback: While military leaders can sometimes be dangerous in politics, our best generals and admirals embody the democratic values and leadership skills for which the country is yearning.
Gen. David Petraeus, commander of U.S. troops in Iraq, Afghanistan and at Centcom, is probably the most decorated officer of his generation.
Donald Trump tests the limits of campaign speech. He makes false statements and refuses to correct them. He attacks other religions and ethnic groups, inflaming domestic tension and foreign terrorist rage.
The Founding Fathers' instructions were clear: The right to free speech includes bad speech; it means tolerance of ideas that many find obnoxious.
The American experiment has always depended on a measure of tolerance and good sense.
We haven't usually had to face the extreme questions about liberty and order because we're not a nation of extremists. We love freedom and good government both.
Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, arguably President Obama's best Cabinet appointment, has been leading a quiet revolution in clean-energy technology. Innovation is transforming this industry, costs are plummeting and entrepreneurs are devising radical new systems that create American jobs - in addition to protecting the planet.
U.S. power flows from our unmatched military might, yes. But in a deeper way, it's a product of the dominance of the U.S. economy.
Politicians often call for sanctions as a way of sounding tough when they don't want to take riskier measures.
Yes, Europe needs to be more welcoming, but that's only half of it. Muslims need to embrace the obligations of European residence and citizenship.
European Muslims need to feel ownership of security, rather than viewing the police as an occupying army.
Europeans don't like to talk about intelligence, and they often pretend their countries don't spy.
The value of catastrophic events is that they can help people face up to problems that are otherwise impossible to address.
The European Union needs to reinvent its security system. It needs to break the stovepipes that prevent sharing information, enforcing borders and protecting citizens.
Experts say that Britain and France have strong spy agencies; Germany's is competent but afraid to level with its public; the rest are relatively weak, and there is no Europe-wide spy agency.
Apple chief executive Tim Cook is such a respected figure that it's easy to overlook the basic problem with his argument about encryption: Cook is asserting that a private company and the interests of its customers should prevail over the public's interest as expressed by our courts.
Training a reliable military force that adheres to Western norms and standards is the work of a generation, not a few months.
Paradoxically, the United States' determination to protect its troops can be self-defeating. Allies and adversaries see U.S. forces living in secure compounds, eating fancy chow and minimizing their exposure to potential terrorist assaults.
As Obama prepares to begin the last year of his presidency, he stands in an unusual position on the national stage: He is the rationalist, a creature of intellect rather than emotion.
The framers hated the tyranny of King George, but they were also afraid of the mob. That's why they put so many checks and balances into our system, to guard against the excesses of a government that might be inflamed by public passion or perverted by a dictator's whim.
Sometimes good countries are so traumatized by events that they lose their bearings and embrace bad leaders.