New media and mobile entertainment are revolutionizing the way people learn about the world.
Stephen Kinzer
During the Cold War, the non-aligned movement tried to become a 'third force' in world politics, but failed because it was too large and unwieldy.
It is never wise to discourage youthful idealism.
Most Pakistani politics is conducted within a narrow spectrum. Politicians spend much time debating the best ways to fight India, or take Kashmir, or dominate Afghanistan, or punish the United States for its real and imagined sins.
Turkey can be a bridge to regimes and actions the United States can't reach. Turkey can talk to people the United States can't talk to.
The Tigris and Euphrates Rivers created the 'Fertile Crescent' where some of the first civilizations emerged. Today they are immensely important resources, politically as well as geographically.
By the late 1970s, repression and economic chaos were causing increasing unrest throughout Latin America. Army strongmen were forced to cede power in Peru, Argentina, Uruguay, Brazil, Ecuador, Bolivia, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras and the Dominican Republic.
Few living figures could contribute as much as Castro to our understanding of the second half of the 20th century.
From the 1920s into the 1940s, Britain's standard of living was supported by oil from Iran. British cars, trucks, and buses ran on cheap Iranian oil. Factories throughout Britain were fueled by oil from Iran. The Royal Navy, which projected British power all over the world, powered its ships with Iranian oil.
No authoritarian leader cedes power easily or turns it over to bodies he cannot control.
During the 19th century, Iranians lost vast territories in disastrous wars, and corrupt monarchs sold everything of value in the country to foreigners.
On Aug. 19, 1953, Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh of Iran became the first victim of a C.I.A. coup. Ten months later, on June 27, 1954, President Jacobo Arbenz of Guatemala became the second.
For many years as a foreign correspondent, I not only worked alongside human rights advocates, but considered myself one of them. To defend the rights of those who have none was the reason I became a journalist in the first place. Now, I see the human rights movement as opposing human rights.
Guatemala's ornate presidential palace, once a terrifying fortress whose every corridor was patrolled by heavily armed soldiers in berets and camouflage uniforms, is now a normal public building where ordinary citizens enter without fear.
Castro has lived almost his entire life as a clandestine revolutionary. To such figures, truth is always malleable, always subservient to political goals.
Guerrilla leaders win wars by being paranoid and ruthless. Once they take power, they are expected to abandon those qualities and embrace opposite ones: tolerance, compromise and humility. Almost none manages to do so.
Iran, in its former incarnation as Persia, created the world's first empire, produced titanic figures like Cyrus, Darius, and Xerxes, and is one of the great fonts of world culture.
Alliances and partnerships produce stability when they reflect realities and interests.
Since German reunification in 1990, historians and researchers have been free to work in the East, where the lost Nazi art collection disappeared.
No offense to Iceland, but Latin America is where the fugitive leaker Edward Snowden should settle.
The Afghans are probably the world champions in resisting foreign domination and infiltration into their country.
In the 1980s, the U.S. Army invaded two Caribbean countries, Grenada and Panama, to depose leaders who had defied Washington.
Iran's most formidable modern leader, Reza Shah Pahlavi, was obsessed with the idea of building a steel mill, but in 1941, soon after he assembled all the components, Allied armies invaded Iran, and the project had to be abandoned.
Emotion is always the enemy of wise statesmanship.
Saudi Arabia supplies much oil to the U.S. And it is the world's largest consumer of American weaponry.
Many troubled Midwestern towns are grasping for ways to fend off decline and, in some cases, extinction.
One day, Mexico will have a leader who is nationalist not simply in rhetoric, but also in fact.
In some countries that are darlings of the West, like Egypt, everyone knows the result of national elections years in advance: The man in power always wins. In others, like Saudi Arabia, the very idea of an election is unthinkable.
In his tub-thumping speech at the 2008 Republican National Convention, Romney sounded like the hedge-fund tycoon he is.
Sultan Beyazid considered his father's art collection decadent and ordered it sold at auction.
Challenging orthodoxy is a death sentence in Washington.
The key to Turkey's success has been its ability to reinvent itself as times change.
'Operation Ajax' presents history in an entirely new way. It takes a true story and uses cutting-edge technology, never before used in this way, to bring it to spectacular life.
Accepting that Arabs have the right to elect their own leaders means accepting the rise of governments that do not share America's pro-Israel militancy.
For decades, Turkey was widely viewed as a reliable NATO ally: prickly at times, but safely in America's corner.
During the 1980s, international interest in the Nicaraguan war was intense. No conflict since the Spanish civil war had provoked such passion around the world. It was a classic good-versus-evil war.
American oil companies - including Amoco, Unocal, Exxon, Pennzoil - have invested billions of dollars in Azerbaijan and plan to invest billions more. As a result, they have developed a strongly pro-Azerbaijan position.
Romney is a classic case of re-invention. As governor of Massachusetts, he supported government-sponsored healthcare, was sympathetic to gay rights, and opposed harsh restrictions on abortion. After measuring the difference between the Massachusetts electorate and the national one to which he must now appeal, he has reversed those positions.
The long-term strategic goals of Iran and the long-term strategic goals of Turkey are close to the long-term strategic goals of the United States.
A few of the world's most famous non-American novelists have large followings in the United States, among them Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Guenter Grass, who were both popular even before winning the Nobel.
There is much to justify Turkey's reverence for Ataturk. He is the force that allowed Turkey to rise from the ashes of defeat and emerge as a vibrant new nation.
One of the immutable patterns of history is the rise and fall of great powers. Those that survive are the ones that adapt as the world changes.
After World War II, the winds of nationalism and anti-colonialism blew through the developing world.
In 1907, Britain and Russia signed a treaty dividing Iran between them; no Iranian was at the negotiations or even knew they were taking place.
The history of Chechnya is one of imperialism gone terribly wrong. In the 13th and 14th centuries, Chechens were among the few peoples to fend off Mongol conquerors, but at a terrible cost. Turks, Persians, and Russians sought to seize Chechnya, and it was finally absorbed into the Russian Empire in 1859.
In 1984, showing extraordinary courage, a group of Guatemalan wives, mothers and other relatives of disappeared people banded together to form the Mutual Support Group for the Appearance Alive of Our Relatives.
The fundamentals of what journalism is about don't necessarily change. What will change is the delivery of news.
Washington sees the various local and national conflicts in the Middle East as part of a battle for regional hegemony between the U.S. and Iran.
Israel deserves special treatment from the United States, both for historical reasons and because there can be no regional peace without a secure Israel.
During the late 1970s and early 1980s, Latin America moved decisively away from military rule and toward civilian democracy.
