It's still too early to say whether Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Mr. Ahmadinejad will succeed in their hard-line coup; de facto opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi remains publicly defiant. Yet it is becoming quite clear - for all who care to see it - what the Khamenei-Ahmadinejad regime will offer if it survives: harsh repression at home and unrelenting hostility toward the West.

--Washington Post

AFGHANISTAN / PAKISTAN

Pakistan Treads Warily as New Fight Looms - Pamela Constable, Washington Post. More than 70 years ago, the British army went to war against tribal forces loyal to a charismatic religious figure in what is now the Pakistani region of Waziristan. The ensuing guerrilla conflict lasted more than a decade. The British troops, though far more numerous and better armed, never captured the renegade leader and finally withdrew from the region. Today, the Pakistani army is preparing to launch a major operation against another warrior in Waziristan, the ruthless Islamist commander Baitullah Mehsud. Taking a lesson from history and its own recent failures, the army is attempting to isolate and weaken Mehsud before sending its troops into battle. Every day for the past two weeks, Pakistani bombers have crisscrossed Mehsud's territory, pounding his suspected hideouts and killing dozens of his fighters, including 16 who officials said died in bombing raids Saturday. Military forces have also surrounded the region to choke off Mehsud's access to weapons and fuel from outside.

The High Price of Eliminating the Taleban from Buner - Jeremy Page, The Times. The road home for Sultan Mahmood was hardly a welcoming sight. The route through the mountains was scattered with burnt-out cars and lorries and lined with the wreckage of buildings destroyed as the army mounted its assault on the Taleban in and around the northwestern region of Swat. At makeshift checkpoints along the way, troops peered from sandbagged machinegun posts as cars and vans snaked back into Buner, the district neighbouring Swat, that has now been declared free of the militants. On the outskirts of Mr Mahmood’s village, Sultanwas, the wreckage of an army tank was still standing on the road - testament to the ferocity of the combat that forced him to flee, one of about two million refugees from the region. Nothing, however, could have prepared the 65-year-old pensioner for the scene of utter devastation when he finally arrived home yesterday in the first wave of refugees to return. His house had been flattened by aerial bombing and artillery fire - along with almost a third of the village of about 1,000 homes.

Pakistanis Begin to Rebuild Lives - Mark Magnier, Los Angeles Times. Nearly two months after Taliban militants expanded from their stronghold in the Swat Valley into neighboring Buner district, touching off an army offensive to remove them, there are early signs here that life is slowly returning to normal. Bazaars have reopened in the two biggest towns, Daggar and Ambela. Power is back up in several larger communities. Men are mixing cement and rebuilding damaged walls. And families are either trickling back or sending older sons ahead to safeguard valuables and harvest overripe crops. The Pakistani army and paramilitary Frontier Corps sought last week to accelerate the recovery process for the district, just 60 miles from the nation's capital, Islamabad, with a series of food aid campaigns. Their aim is to add to the improved public image they've enjoyed since initiating their offensive against the Taliban in late April. The fighting caused more than 2 million people to flee the region.

IRAQ

Unease Mounts as US Troops Leave Iraq's Cities - China Chon, Wall Street Journal. American commanders and Iraqi officials and residents are watching with growing unease as US combat forces end their duty in Iraq's urban areas this week, amid almost daily reports of violence. US officials worry that as they continue to battle the remnants of an insurgency and efforts to reignite sectarian strife, they will be losing critical, on-the-ground intelligence gleaned from the neighborhoods they once lived in and patrolled. The boots-on-the-ground approach was crucial to the Pentagon's mostly successful surge strategy in Baghdad. Many Iraqis are still deeply suspicious of the sectarian leanings of the country's nascent security forces. For them, the pullout of American troops means the disappearance of an effective check on suspect Iraqi soldiers and police officers.

US Poised to Let Iraqis Take Lead - Richard Tomkins, Washington Times. Ten days before Tuesday's deadline for US withdrawal from Iraqi cities, the war came full circle with the transfer to Iraqi control of two small but heavily symbolic bases in northeast Baghdad. Joint Security Forces Apache in Adhamiyah and Joint Security Forces Sadr City were signed over - the first without fanfare, the second in more ceremonial fashion. On April 10, 2003, Adhamiyah Palace was the focal point for one of the last big gunbattles during the US capture of Baghdad as Marines battled for more than seven hours to hold off Iraqi soldiers and jihadi gunmen. Five years later, the base near Sadr City played a key role in the surge of US troops that crippled the Shi'ite gunmen of anti-US cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and stopped a rain of rocket fire on the international zone housing the US Embassy and much of the Iraqi government.

Top US Officer Says Iraqis Ready for Handover - Al Pessin, Voice of America. The United States' top military officer says he believes Iraqi forces are ready to take full control of their country's cities on Tuesday, as called for in the US-Iraq security agreement. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen spoke to reporters traveling with him in Europe. In a conversation with a small group of reporters, Admiral Mike Mullen was asked whether he is confident the Iraqi forces can handle the duties they are about to take on. "I am, and I take that from not only my own interaction there, which is infrequent, but really the reports I get back routinely and the leaders I talk to, not just General Odierno but others that have that confidence as well," Mullen said. "They're going to need some support. They're going to need some enablers. But the United States military leadership in Iraq is confident that they can do that." US and other international forces will continue to provide air support to the Iraqi forces, as well as help with logistics, reconnaissance and other functions that enable combat troops and local police to do their jobs. Al-Qaida and other insurgent groups have already begun an expected surge in attacks to challenge the new arrangement. Admiral Mullen says he is concerned, but his commander in Iraq, and the former commander who now heads all US military operations in the region, tell him the Iraqi forces are ready.

US Commander Says Iraq Forces Ready - Derrick Henry, New York Times. Gen. Ray Odierno, the American commander in Iraq, said Sunday that Iraq’s military and police units were ready to operate on their own, ahead of Tuesday’s deadline for the withdrawal of American combat troops from the country’s cities and towns. “I do believe they’re ready,” General Odierno said from Baghdad on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “They’ve been working towards this for a long time. And security remains good.” American troop strength is scheduled to stay at roughly 130,000 until September, with most of the forces living in operating bases away from cities, military officials say. The Iraqis will be able to call on American support if needed. General Odierno, who also appeared on “Fox News Sunday,” said that he had seen “constant improvement” in the security force and governance in the region despite some large attacks last week.

1st Pullout Deadline Stirs Anxiety, Pride in Iraq - Ernesto Londoño, Washington Post. American troops have been thinning out across Baghdad and other restive cities in recent months. Since Jan. 1, the US military has shut down more than 150 bases and outposts. In deference to the security agreement that set the pullout deadlines, American troops in and near urban areas have begun avoiding nonessential outings during the daytime and will be on virtual lockdown during the first days of July. But they expect to continue conducting patrols in urban areas alongside Iraqi security forces in the months ahead. "On 1 July, we're not going to see this big puff of smoke, everyone leaving the cities," Brig. Gen. Stephen R. Lanza, a spokesman for the US military, said recently. Nonetheless, some Iraqis see the date as an independence day of sorts.

Ready or Not, Iraq’s Military Prepares to Stand on Its Own - Rod Nordland, New York Times. Maj. Gen. Fadhil Jameel Birwari, commander of the Iraqi Special Forces’ First Brigade, granted a brief interview early this month at a celebration of the opening of a base for one of his battalions within the larger expanse of the Forward Operating Base here. The first and, as it turned out, only question was one everyone is asking with the approach of Tuesday’s June 30 deadline for handing most combat duties to Iraqis: Were General Fadhil’s counterterrorism soldiers, among the country’s most elite, ready to take over from the Americans after they withdraw from all Iraqi cities and towns?

Iraq Ups Security Ahead of US Pullout - Patrick Quinn, Associated Press. Iraqi security forces bolstered checkpoints and banned motorcycles from the streets of Baghdad as they prepared Sunday for more violence before this week's withdrawal of US combat troops from the capital and other cities and towns. Despite the increased checks, a roadside bomb targeting a US convoy in eastern Baghdad wounded six bystanders. It was unclear whether anyone in the convoy was injured, police said. A car bomb also exploded in the parking lot of a police academy in western Baghdad, killing one police officer and wounding six others, police said, speaking on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to speak to the media. Iraq's main Sunni political bloc joined Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki in describing the June 30 deadline for the US withdrawal from urban areas as a turning point for the country.

Corruption Plays Key Role in Iraqi Justice - Ned Parker, Los Angeles Times. Sheik Maher Sirhan says his interrogators tortured him with electric rods and demanded $50,000 in cash to free him from the Iraqi jail where he is being held on terrorism charges. But the Sunni Arab paramilitary leader, who has worked closely with US forces, says he is hanging tough. "I said that I'm not giving you the money," Sirhan said in a phone conversation from his latest jail cell. "There is a government and coalition forces. Justice will release me, not you." The accounts of Sirhan and two other prominent Sunni paramilitary leaders, one recently released and the other on the run, provide a window into the role that political disputes and corruption appear to be playing in at least some arrests as the American era in Iraq draws to a close, with this week's departure of most US troops from the nation's cities. An Iraqi government official who works on security issues said the problem of Iraqi forces jailing people for ulterior motives is a long-standing one.

Is the Job Done? - John P. Hannah, Los Angeles Times. On Tuesday, US troops will leave Iraqi cities in accordance with an agreement negotiated under President Bush. Although President Obama has largely endorsed the Bush timeline for reducing the US military presence in Iraq, far less clear is the extent to which he has also adopted his predecessor's appreciation for the importance of achieving America's strategic goals there. For all his administration's mistakes in Iraq, Bush clearly understood the imperative of victory once US forces were committed. He knew that removing our troops under fire would have been disastrous. Al Qaeda and Iran would have been emboldened. American credibility throughout the Middle East would have been shattered. Iraq would have descended into chaos, further destabilizing a region vital to US interests. More positively, Bush also understood that fulfilling our commitment to help Iraq establish a stable democracy could dramatically advance long-term US interests. The Arab Middle East - the region that provided the ideology, funding, leadership and foot soldiers for the 9/11 attacks - would get a powerful example of a successful, modernizing democracy. And the United States would secure a strategic foothold in one of the Muslim world's historic centers of political, religious and cultural power.

IRAN

Iran Arrests Iranian Employees of British Embassy as Protests Return - Michael Slackman, New York Times. Iran’s government said Sunday that it had arrested Iranian employees of the British Embassy, while the police in Tehran beat and fired tear gas at several thousand protesters who joined a demonstration at a mosque in support of the defeated presidential candidate Mir Hussein Moussavi. The government’s arrest of nine Iranian employees of the British Embassy was a significant escalation in its conflict with Britain, which Tehran has sought to cast as an instigator of the unrest since the disputed June 12 election. It said the embassy employees played a significant role in organizing the protests, which have reached across the country and across social and economic lines. Tehran also continued to charge journalists with working as agents of discord, publishing one editor’s “confession” while continuing to keep others behind bars without charge, or barred from working.

Thousands of Iranians Ignore Threats, March in Rally - Borzou Daragahi, Los Angeles Times. Thousands of Iranians disputing the reelection of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad marched at an unauthorized rally Sunday, defying truncheon-wielding security forces and dire threats by Iranian leaders. Meanwhile, European leaders' hackles were raised by the arrest a day earlier of eight British Embassy staffers in Tehran, a move that has sharpened Iran's confrontation with the West over the disputed election and its violent aftermath. Several of the staffers, all Iranian nationals, were quickly released. Supporters of Ahmadinejad's opponent, Mir-Hossein Mousavi, gathered at a mosque in northeast Tehran during an annual commemoration for 72 Iranian politicians killed in a bombing 28 years ago. Videos on YouTube purported to show demonstrators with hands in the air in front of the Ghoba mosque, chanting boisterously in support of Mousavi.

Protests Flare Ahead of Ruling on Iran Vote - Farnaz Fassihi, Wall Street Journal. Thousands of protesters clashed with security forces at a mosque Sunday in Tehran - marking the first major demonstration after a few days of uneasy calm - as Iran's arrest of local employees of the British Embassy on Saturday escalated tensions with the West. Iranian media Sunday reported nine British Embassy employees had been detained for allegedly playing a role in demonstrations in Tehran protesting the results of the country's presidential elections. Meanwhile, Mohamad Mostafaei, a lawyer who represents Iranians under the age of 18 facing the country's death penalty, has also been arrested, the organization Stop Child Executions said. The Guardian Council, a supervising clerical committee, is scheduled to certify the results of the vote Monday. It is widely expected that it will uphold earlier announcements declaring President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the winner of the race by a landslide.

Iran Releases 5 British Embassy Staff - Voice of America. Iran says it has released five Iranian staffers of the British Embassy in Tehran, days after they were detained for alleged links to the nation's post-election unrest. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hassan Qashqavi told a news conference Monday that five of nine arrested were freed, and the remainder are being held for questioning. Earlier reports said eight British Embassy workers had been arrested. British Foreign Secretary David Miliband and European Union foreign ministers have demanded that all the staffers be released, calling their detention an unacceptable form of harassment and intimidation. A report Sunday quoted the nation's intelligence minister, Qolam Hosein Mohseni-Ejei, as saying he has proof that some of the local staffers collected news about the recent protests.

Arrests in Iran Raise Ire of UK - Jeanne Whalen, Wall Street Journal. Iran arrested nine local employees of the British Embassy in Tehran at the weekend, drawing a terse response from the UK government and signaling an escalation of tensions between two countries with a history of difficult relations. Iranian media reported the arrests on Sunday, saying the employees had been detained for allegedly playing a role in post-election demonstrations in Tehran. Speaking during a visit to Greece, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband said some of the nine arrested Saturday, had been released, though he didn't say how many. A UK Foreign Office spokeswoman said Sunday that some staff were still being held, but she declined to say how many. She also declined to comment on the circumstances of their arrest. "The United Kingdom is deeply concerned at the arrest and, in some cases, continued detention of some of our hard-working, locally engaged staff in Tehran," Mr. Miliband said Sunday. "This is harassment and intimidation of a kind which is quite unacceptable.

Iran 'Has Arrested 2,000’ in Violent Crackdown on Dissent - Martin Fletcher, The Times. More than 2,000 Iranians have been arrested and hundreds more have disappeared since the regime decided to crush dissent after the disputed presidential election, a leading human rights organisation said yesterday. “A climate of terror and of fear reigns in Iran today,” the International Federation for Human Rights , an umbrella body for 155 human rights organisations, said as it released the startling figures. Last night 3,000 protesters tried to gather outside a mosque in Tehran where they believed that Mir Hossein Mousavi, the defeated presidential candidate, was going to speak. The police rapidly dispersed them and Mr Mousavi never appeared. Having largely suppressed such protests, the security forces are engaged in a purge of dissidents in an apparent effort to decapitate Mr Mousavi’s so-called green movement.

Crackdown In Iran Puts Mousavi in Tight Spot - Thomas Erdbrink, Washington Post. With the opposition visibly weakening in Iran amid a government crackdown, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his supporters have begun to use his disputed victory in this month's election to toughen the nation's stance internationally and to consolidate control internally. In recent days, they have vilified President Obama for what they call his "interventionist policies," have said they are ready to put opposition candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi's advisers on trial and have threatened to execute some of the Mousavi supporters who took to the streets to protest the election result. On Sunday, news agencies reported that the police broke up another opposition gathering - witnesses said it numbered about 2,000 - and detained eight British Embassy staff members, accusing them of a role in organizing the demonstrations. The actions reflect the growing power of a small coterie of hard-line clerics and Revolutionary Guard Corps commanders, Iranian analysts say.

European Union Warns Iran Against Acts of Intimidation - Reuters. The European Union on Sunday condemned Iran’s crackdown on postelection protesters and said it would meet any Iranian intimidation of European diplomatic staff with a “strong and collective EU response.” Foreign Minister Carl Bildt of Sweden, which takes over the European Union presidency starting Wednesday, said the Iranian government had done damage to itself at home and abroad through the response to the disputed June 12 vote. The Iranian government has said the incumbent president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, won in a nearly 2-to-1 landslide over his main challenger, Mir Hussein Moussavi, who has accused the government of stealing the vote. The government has said the results are final and that protesters will be dealt with sternly. “Obviously the regime is trying to preserve its position by very harsh repression,” Mr. Bildt said. “But that cannot hide the fact that this is a weakened regime. It has lost legitimacy both internally and externally.”

Understanding Iran: Repression 101 - David E. Sanger, New York Times. When the rallying cry on the streets of Tehran turned from “Death to America!” to the stranger-sounding “Death to the Dictator!” there was a great temptation to conclude that the days of the mullahs were numbered. Maybe they are and maybe not; as President Obama said on Tuesday, “we don’t know yet how this thing is going to play out.” But inside Mr. Obama’s National Security Council, and around the world, versions of the same question were being asked: Will the resort to raw repression work? Or will it eventually backfire, only widening the huge political breach that the election laid bare? The history of repression to save regimes - or at least their leaders - is long. And every case is different: Some regimes are brittle in the face of popular pressure while others are supple in adapting to it; some can use nationalism as their trump card, while for others, it is an Achilles’ heel. And if some regimes are simple tyrannies, the structure of Iran’s political system is especially complex and opaque.

No Velvet Revolution for Iran - Fareed Zakaria, Washington Post opinion. When we see the kinds of images that have been coming out of Iran over the past two weeks, we tend to think back to 1989 and Eastern Europe. Then, when people took to the streets and challenged their governments, those seemingly stable regimes proved to be hollow and quickly collapsed. What emerged was liberal democracy. Could Iran yet undergo its own velvet revolution? It's possible but unlikely. While the regime's legitimacy has cracked - a fatal wound in the long run - for now it will probably be able to use its guns and money to consolidate power. And it has plenty of both. Remember, the price of oil was less than $20 a barrel back in 1989. It is $69 now. More important, as Zbigniew Brzezinski has pointed out, 1989 was highly unusual. As a historical precedent, it has not proved a useful guide to other antidictatorial movements. The three most powerful forces in the modern world are democracy, religion and nationalism. In 1989 in Eastern Europe, all three were arrayed against the ruling regimes. Citizens hated their governments because they deprived people of liberty and political participation. Believers despised communists because they were atheistic, banning religion in countries where faith was deeply cherished. And people rejected their regimes because they saw them as imposed from the outside by a much-disliked imperial power, the Soviet Union.

What If Obama Did Want to Help Iran's Democrats? - Gabriel Schoenfeld, Wall Street Journal opinion. Thus far, debate over American policy toward Iran has revolved around President Barack Obama's various responses. When Iran's electoral crisis first erupted, he downplayed its significance, calling the two rival candidates, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Mir Hossein Mousavi, "tweedledum and tweedledee." A week later, he sharply condemned the Islamic regime, describing himself as "appalled and outraged" by the government's actions. But are presidential pronouncements - however pusillanimous or intrepid - the limit of American power? The ayatollahs' nuclear ambitions make Iran one the most critical countries for the future of US foreign policy. Beyond the immediate problem of nuclear proliferation, there is the broader issue of Iranian influence spreading via proxy forces in Lebanon, Syria and Gaza. And even beyond that, the Iranian Revolution of 1979 is the original wellspring of the Islamic fundamentalism that has swept the world over the past three decades.

THE LONG WAR

New Rift Opens Over Rights of Detainees - Jess Bravin, Wall Street Journal. The Justice Department has determined that detainees tried by military commissions in the US can claim at least some constitutional rights, particularly protection against the use of statements taken through coercive interrogations, officials said. The conclusion, explained in a confidential memorandum whose contents were shared with The Wall Street Journal, could alter significantly the way the commissions operate - and has created new divisions among the agencies responsible for overseeing the commissions. Defense Department officials warn that the Justice Department position could reduce the chance of convicting some defendants. Military prosecutors have said involuntary statements comprise the lion's share of their evidence against dozens of Guantanamo prisoners who could be tried. The Obama Justice Department's view is a sharp turn from that of the Bush administration, which argued detainees have no constitutional rights. It isn't clear how the Obama administration will act, but the Justice Department's legal counsel's office traditionally has the last word on constitutional interpretation in the executive branch. The White House declined to comment.

New Guidance Issued on Military Trials of Detainees - David Johnston, New York Times. The Justice Department has advised an Obama administration panel trying to devise a new system for trying terrorist detainees that defendants have some constitutional rights if they are tried by military commissions in the United States, notably including protections regarding statements against them obtained through coercive interrogations, administration officials said Sunday. The new legal guidance, issued in early May by the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, the principal interpreter of the law for the executive branch, suggested that federal courts could set aside convictions by military tribunals that were based on coerced statements on the ground that they violated a defendant’s right to due process. It is not clear whether the legal advice, first reported by The Wall Street Journal, is a formal opinion or represents a less binding advisory written at the request of the administration panel exploring ways to deal with detainee issues to fulfill President Obama’s promise to close the detention center at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, by next January.

Will Obama Follow Bush Or FDR? - Benjamin Wittes and Jack Goldsmith, Washington Post opinion. Soon after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the Bush administration faced a fateful choice about terrorist detainees: Should it get Congress on board, or go it alone? President George W. Bush bypassed the legislature and for seven years based U.S. detention policy on his own constitutional authority, Congress's general authorization for the war against al-Qaeda and its affiliates, and the international laws of war. Working with Congress would be hard, administration officials reasoned; the legislature might constrain executive flexibility; and the president had powerful arguments that he didn't need additional legislative support. Today, President Obama faces much the same choice, and he appears sorely tempted to follow the same road, for the same reasons: "White House officials are increasingly worried that reaching quick agreement with Congress on a new detention system may be impossible," The Post reported Saturday, and "Congress may try to assert too much control over the process." Obama is considering creating a long-term detention apparatus by presidential executive order based on essentially the same legal authorities the Bush administration used.

US NATIONAL SECURITY

Target: Hawaii - Wall Street Journal opinion. The Pentagon recently announced that it is repositioning ground-to-air radar and missile defenses near Hawaii in case North Korea decides to launch another long-range missile, this time toward the Aloha State. So at least 1.3 million Hawaiians will benefit from defenses that many officials in the current Administration didn't even want to build. But what about the rest of us? It's an odd time to be cutting missile defense, as the Obama Administration is doing in its 2010 budget - by $1.2 billion to $1.6 billion, depending on how you calculate it. Programs to defend the US homeland are being pared, while those that protect our soldiers or allies are being expanded after the Pentagon decided that the near-term threat is from short-range missiles. But as North Korea and Iran show, rogue regimes aren't far from having missiles that could reach the US.

Our Decaying Nuclear Deterrent - Jon Kyl and Richard Perle, Wall Street Journal opinion. A bipartisan congressional commission, headed by some of our most experienced national security practitioners, recently concluded that a nuclear deterrent is essential to our defense for the foreseeable future. It also recommended that urgent measures be taken to keep that deterrent safe and effective. Unfortunately, President Barack Obama has adopted an agenda that runs counter to the commission's recommendations. Consider the president's declaration, in a major speech this spring in Prague, of "America's commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons." Will such a world be peaceful and secure? It is far from self-evident.

AFRICA

Somalia Moves to Forefront on AU Summit Agenda - Peter Heinlein, Voice of America. Somali government's recent declaration of a state of emergency has moved the country's security crisis to the top rank of items for consideration at this week's African Union summit. From AU headquarters in Addis Ababa our correspondent reports that summit leaders will consider issuing a call for direct military intervention. Fast-moving events in Somalia are propelling the Horn of Africa to urgent status on the summit agenda. After his government declared an emergency last week, Deputy Prime Minister Sharif Hasan Sheikh Adan flew to Addis Ababa to plead with Ethiopian and AU leaders for enhanced military support. Ethiopia pulled troops out of the besieged Somali capital, Mogadishu, earlier this year and is reluctant to return without a strong mandate from the international community. The 5,000 strong African Union peacekeeping force AMISOM is overstretched. It also lacks the mandate that would allow peacekeepers to defend against an expected offensive by the radical rebel group al-Shabab, which is trying to impose strict Islamic law, or Sharia, in a country that practices a moderate brand of Islam.

Somali Pirates Free Belgian Ship's Crew - Associated Press. Somali pirates released the entire crew of a Belgian ship kidnapped two months ago after a ransom was paid, the government said Sunday. The 10-member crew of the Pompei dredger were in good health, it said. Defense Minister Pieter De Crem told a news conference a ransom was paid for the release of the hostages. He declined to say how much, but said pirates had demanded $8 million. The money was dropped onto the deck of the Belgian vessel on Saturday from a helicopter, Mr. De Crem said. The ship and its crew of two Belgians, a Dutch, three Filipinos and four Croatians were seized April 18 a few hundred miles north of the Seychelles islands as they were sailing to South Africa. Despite international navy patrols, piracy has exploded in the Gulf of Aden and around Somalia's 1,900-mile coastline. Pirates are able to operate freely because Somalia has had no effective central government in nearly 20 years.

Guinea-Bissau Votes for New Leader - Associated Press. A trickle of voters headed to the polls to choose this tiny nation's next leader, less than four months after the president was assassinated and following a campaign marred by the killing of a candidate. The March 2 shooting of President Joao Bernardo "Nino" Vieira was another setback for Guinea-Bissau, where the military has held sway over politicians for decades. The poor West African country has suffered successive coups and upheavals since its 1974 independence from Portugal, and no president in 15 years has completed a full five-year term. Mr. Vieira's killing also was thought to be political -- linked to the death a day earlier of his longtime rival, the head of the armed forces, who was killed in a bomb blast. Analysts said that while a sense of fear and insecurity lingers over the country of 1.5 million, Sunday's ballot would likely be peaceful, with the real test coming afterward.

AMERICAS

Coup Rocks Honduras - Paul Kiernan, Jose de Cordoba and Jay Solomon, Wall Street Journal. Honduran soldiers rousted President Manuel Zelaya from his bed and exiled him at gunpoint Sunday to Costa Rica, halting his controversial push to redraw the constitution but spurring fresh concerns about democratic rule across Latin America. "I was awakened by shots, and the yells of my guards, who resisted for about 20 minutes," Mr. Zelaya said, describing the predawn raid of his home to reporters at the San José airport in Costa Rica, where he was flown against his will. "I came out in my pajamas, I'm still in my pajamas....When (the soldiers) came in, they pointed their guns at me and told me they would shoot if I didn't put down my cellphone." Mr. Zelaya called the action a kidnapping, and said he was still president. The US and other countries condemned the coup. President Barack Obama said he was "deeply concerned" and called on all political actors in Honduras to "respect democratic norms." Venezuela President Hugo Chávez, a close ally of Mr. Zelaya and nemesis of the US, said he would consider it an ''act of war" if there were hostilities against his diplomats. "I have put the armed forces of Venezuela on alert," Mr. Chávez said. Central American leaders called a summit including the ousted president for Monday in Managua, Nicaragua to deal with the crisis, and the UN General Assembly planned to meet.

Honduran Military Ousts President - William Booth and Juan Forero, Washington Post. Soldiers stormed the presidential palace in the Honduran capital of Tegucigalpa at dawn Sunday and forced President Manuel Zelaya into exile in Costa Rica. The military-led ouster sparked a regional crisis that thrusts the impoverished banana-growing country onto the international stage and revives painful memories of coup-fueled turmoil in Latin America. The coup was condemned throughout the Americas. President Obama joined other regional leaders in calling for a peaceful return of Zelaya to office. But the Honduran National Congress defiantly announced that Zelaya was out, and its members named congressional leader Roberto Micheletti the new president on Sunday afternoon.

Honduran President Is Ousted in Coup - Elisabeth Malkin, New York Times. President Manuel Zelaya of Honduras was ousted by the army on Sunday, capping months of tensions over his efforts to lift presidential term limits. In the first military coup in Central America since the end of the cold war, soldiers stormed the presidential palace in the capital, Tegucigalpa, early in the morning, disarming the presidential guard, waking Mr. Zelaya and putting him on a plane to Costa Rica. Mr. Zelaya, a leftist aligned with President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, angrily denounced the coup as illegal. “I am the president of Honduras,” he insisted at the airport in San José, Costa Rica, still wearing his pajamas. Later Sunday the Honduran Congress voted him out of office, replacing him with the president of Congress, Roberto Micheletti. The military offered no public explanation for its actions, but the Supreme Court issued a statement saying that the military had acted to defend the law against “those who had publicly spoken out and acted against the Constitution’s provisions.” Leaders across the hemisphere, however, denounced the coup, which American officials on Sunday said they had been working for several days to avert.

Honduran President Ousted in Coup; Replacement is Named - Tracy Wilkinson and Alex Renderos, Los Angeles Times. In a throwback to Latin America's unstable past, the Honduran army ousted President Manuel Zelaya on Sunday, sending the leftist leader into exile as a hastily convened Congress replaced him with its speaker, one of Zelaya's fiercest enemies. The coup was a brazen blow to the region's seemingly solid move to democratic rule, the first such military action in Central America in 16 years. It followed weeks of confrontation between Zelaya and conservative forces in Honduras that came to a head over possible changes to the constitution. Zelaya was seized from his home, still in his pajamas, hours ahead of a nonbinding vote on the reforms, including one that could allow presidential reelection in Honduras. "This has been a brutal kidnapping," Zelaya said later Sunday in a news conference at the airport in San Jose, the Costa Rican capital. He described how masked soldiers burst into his home before dawn, firing warning shots, shouting and pointing a gun at his chest. He was hauled away to a Honduran air force jet, he said, and flown to Costa Rica.

US, Venezuela Condemn Honduran Coup - Carmen Gentile and Nicholas Kralev, Washington Times. In an unusual concurrence of views, the Obama administration and Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said they still recognized Mr. Zelaya as Honduras' president. The State Department called the events an "attempted coup" and urged Mr. Zelaya's "return and restoration of democratic order." US officials said they were engaged in multinational efforts to resolve the crisis, through the Organization of American States and European allies. At the same time, Washington wants a resolution "free from external influence and interference," a senior official told reporters during a conference call organized by the State Department. The official, who spoke on the condition that he not be named, said the US Embassy in Honduras was "consistently and almost constantly engaged in the last several weeks working with partners" and that US officials were "in contact with all Honduran institutions, including the military." However, the military stopped taking the embassy's calls since the coup attempt, the official said. Mr. Chavez, a close ally of Mr. Zelaya and a survivor of a failed 2002 coup attempt himself, warned that if the Venezuelan ambassador to Honduras was harmed or killed during the military uprising, Venezuela "would have to act militarily" and that he had already "put the Venezuelan armed forces on alert."

Rare Hemisphere Unity in Assailing Honduran Coup - Simon Romero, New York Times. With their condemnation on Sunday of the coup ousting President Manuel Zelaya in Honduras, governments in the Western Hemisphere from across the ideological spectrum found a rare issue around which they could swiftly arrive at unity. At the same time, from the Obama administration’s measured response to the reaction of President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, who put his military on alert over an apparent affront to the Venezuelan ambassador in Honduras, the responses both revealed and disguised fissures over different forms of democratic government that are taking root in the region. On the one side are countries like Venezuela, Bolivia and Ecuador, where voters have given much greater power to their populist presidents, partly by allowing them to extend their time in office and sometimes eroding the function of Congress and the Supreme Court, institutions portrayed as allies of the old oligarchy. On the other side are nations of varying ideological hues, including Brazil, Latin America’s rising power, where resilient institutions have allowed for more diversity of participants in politics, ruling out the so-called participatory democracy that Mr. Chávez, the Venezuelan president, has been eager to promote in the region.

Ousted Honduran President Arrives in Nicaragua for Presidents' Meeting - Voice of America. Ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya has arrived in Nicaragua, following his removal from office Sunday by Honduran soldiers. The military detained Mr. Zelaya and sent him to Costa Rica in the early-morning hours Sunday - the day he set for a referendum on changing the constitution to allow him to run for another term. Mr. Zelaya arrived in Nicaragua from Costa Rica late Sunday for a scheduled meeting of Latin American presidents Monday. The man Honduran lawmakers have appointed as acting president after the ouster of Mr. Zelaya says his rise to the office was a legal transition process. Roberto Micheletti, head of the Honduran Congress, said after his swearing-in that Mr. Zelaya's removal from office was not a coup. Mr. Micheletti has imposed a national nighttime curfew to run through Tuesday.

Colombia's Uribe Faces a More Wary US - Juan Forero, Washington Post. In a White House ceremony in January, President George W. Bush awarded Colombian President Álvaro Uribe the Presidential Medal of Freedom and praised him for his "immense personal courage and strength of character" for taking on his country's fight against Marxist guerrillas. On Monday, Uribe again arrives at the White House. But this time he will encounter an administration pushing to expand its alliances in Latin America and increasingly worried about Colombia's dismal human rights record, Colombia experts say. Obama administration officials declined interview requests to discuss policy toward Colombia, a country that has received nearly $6 billion in mostly military aid since Uribe took office in 2002.

Argentina's Kirchners Suffer Setback - Matt Moffett, Wall Street Journal. President Cristina Kirchner suffered a stunning setback in Argentina's congressional elections, losing absolute majorities in both houses of Congress. Mrs. Kirchner's husband and predecessor, Nestor Kirchner, lost his own bid for a seat from Buenos Aires province in Sunday's election. He trailed Francisco de Narváez, having taken 32.2% to Mr. de Narváez's 34.5% after 91% of the vote was counted. Ruling party allies have also lost key races in Buenos Aires city and Santa Fe and Cordoba provinces. Mr. Kirchner conceded defeat early Monday. He says in the coming days, the party will evaluate its mistakes. The setback may have significant regional implications, suggesting a possible waning in the appeal of the populist governments that have risen over the past decade here and in Venezuela, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Honduras. Honduras's leftist president was toppled in a military coup on Sunday.

Ex-President of Argentina Trails in Bid for Congress - Alexei Barrionuevo, New York Times. Néstor Kirchner, the former president and head of the governing Peronist Party, was trailing late Sunday in his bid to win a seat in congressional elections that have become a referendum on the leadership of him and of his wife, the current president, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. With 65.6 percent of votes counted in Buenos Aires Province, Mr. Kirchner’s Front for Victory coalition had 32.3 percent of the vote, trailing the Union-PRO party led by Francisco de Narváez, a congressman and businessman, with 34.7 percent. Mr. Kirchner, who as president guided the country out of its devastating economic crisis of 2001, ran as part of an effort to save the Peronists from a humiliating defeat in the congressional elections. If he cannot muster a first-place finish, the chances that the couple will continue their political dynasty in the 2011 presidential elections will dim badly, political and investment-risk analysts said.

Ruling Party Loses Majority in Argentine Parliamentary Elections - Voice of America. Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner's ruling Peronist Party was dealt a serious blow in Sunday's mid-term election with its loss of control of Congress. Her husband, former President Nestor Kirchner, was defeated in his race against wealthy businessman Francisco de Narvaez for a seat representing the populous Buenos Aires province. Voters cast ballots Sunday for representatives for half of the lower house of Congress and one-third of the Senate posts. Complete results have yet to be announced. Allies of President Fernandez have controlled the Argentinian Congress for six years. But recent polls indicated support for the president had fallen to 30%, with the economy to blame.

ASIA PACIFIC

South Korea, Japan Want North Korea to Return to Talks - Associated Press. The leaders of South Korea and Japan pledged Sunday to work together to bring North Korea back to the table for negotiations aimed at persuading the isolated regime to abandon its nuclear-weapons program. South Korean President Lee Myung-bak spent the day in Tokyo for meetings with Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso, a month after Pyongyang's underground nuclear test ratcheted up tensions in the region. The leaders, who spoke to reporters at Mr. Aso's residence, said they also discussed how to foster stronger economic cooperation. Mr. Aso said initial negotiations aimed at eventually forming a free-trade agreement would be held on July 1. "We need to demonstrate that North Korea has nothing to gain by conducting nuclear tests and missile launches," said Mr. Lee.

UN Chief Seeks to Free Reporters in N. Korea - Betsy Pisik, Washington Times. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Sunday that he is making personal efforts to try to free two US journalists imprisoned in North Korea and that he played a role in the release last month of another jailed journalist in Iran. "I have taken my own effort to facilitate any release of these American journalists, but I have not heard anything," he told The Washington Times on Sunday. "You can understand my frustration." The two women - Laura Ling and Euna Lee - were sentenced earlier this month to 12 years of hard labor after they were arrested near the China-North Korea border in March.

War Hero in Vietnam Forces Government to Listen - Seth Mydans, New York Times. Vietnam’s great war hero, Gen. Vo Nguyen Giap, has stood up to defend his country once again, this time against what he says would be a huge mistake by the government - a vast mining operation run by a Chinese company. Now 97, the commander who led his country to victory over both France and the United States has emerged as the most prominent voice in a broad popular protest that is challenging the secretive workings of the country’s Communist leaders. In an unusual step, the government has taken note of the criticisms in recent weeks and appears to be making at least gestures of response, saying it will review the project’s environmental impact and slow its full implementation.

China's Information Dam - Washington Post editorial. "It is not our job to fix the Chinese government," Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz said last week. Maybe not. But search engines operating in China face a dilemma come July. Starting Wednesday, China is embarking on a broad initiative to clamp down on Web content the government views as obscene, billing these efforts as a fight against pornography. For Chinese officials, there has always been an overlap between pornography and references to politically sensitive topics such as the Falun Gong and Tiananmen Square. June traditionally marks a crackdown in China's Web censorship as the country brings down sites such as You Tube (inaccessible since March) and Twitter for the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. But more is in the works. The plan? Fine and shut down all sites offering unapproved information on sexual health, command Google to close access to foreign Web sites and push for the pre-installation of censorship software called "Green Dam" on all computers. As this list reveals, China's Web censorship efforts go far beyond the stated goal of protecting against pornography.

EUROPE

NATO Restores Ties With Russia - Associated Press. NATO and Russia have agreed to resume military ties in their first high-level meeting since Russia's war with Georgia disrupted their relations 10 months ago. NATO's outgoing Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer announced Saturday that the so-called NATO-Russia Council, a panel set up in 2002 to improve ties between the former Cold War rivals, was operational again. "It was my ambition to leave to my successor an NRC that is up and running," said Mr. Scheffer, whose term as secretary-general ends Aug. 1. "After the meeting which just ended, I have achieved that aim. Because there was clearly a sense in that meeting that the NRC, which had been in neutral ... is now back in gear," he said. "We also agreed to restart the military to military contacts." Relations between the alliance and the Russian military were frozen after the five-day Georgian war last August. Although political ties have thawed considerably over the past five months, there had been no formal military contacts since then.

MIDDLE EAST

Hariri Grapples With Task Of Governing With Hezbollah - Chip Cummins and Nada Raad, Wall Street Journal. Lebanese prime minister-designate Saad Hariri began to form a new government over the weekend, following his election victory earlier this month over an opposition backed by Hezbollah. Violence broke out late Sunday in Beirut as supporters of Mr. Hariri clashed with those of a rival faction in an exchange of gunfire that left one woman dead and two injured. Lebanon's armed forces quickly intervened. The clash appeared an isolated incident amid a largely peaceful post-election period. Lebanon's president tapped Mr. Hariri on Saturday to cobble together the country's next cabinet. Many analysts expect the task to be as difficult as the June 7 parliamentary election, when with polls predicting big gains by the opposition, Mr. Hariri's Western-backed coalition managed to hold onto its majority in parliament. Despite the skirmish, the elevation of Mr. Hariri, the 39-year-old billionaire son of the late former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, marks what many analysts say could be a fresh, hopeful chapter in Lebanon's recent, tumultuous politics.

Israel May Shift on Settlements Freeze Amid Broader Effort - Etha Bronner, New York Times. Israel would be open to a complete freeze of settlement building in the West Bank for three to six months as part of a broad Middle East peace endeavor that included a Palestinian agreement to negotiate an end to the conflict and confidence-building steps by major Arab nations, senior Israeli officials said Sunday. The officials spoke before a planned meeting in Washington on Tuesday between Israel’s defense minister, Ehud Barak, and George J. Mitchell, the Obama administration’s Middle East envoy, and said this was the message Mr. Barak would take with him. The freeze would not affect construction that was already under way, nor include East Jerusalem. But it would mean that during the specified time no construction of any kind could start even in the close-in settlement blocks that Israel expects to keep in any future two-state agreement with the Palestinians.

Israel Considers Compromise on Settlement Freeze - Robert Berger, Voice of America. Israel is considering a compromise with the United States on the thorny issue of Jewish settlements. Israel's Cabinet discussed the possibility of a partial freeze on construction in Jewish settlements at its weekly meeting. Israel has been seeking a compromise, following repeated demands by the United States to halt settlement expansion as required by the internationally backed "Roadmap" peace plan. The issue will top the agenda when Defense Minister Ehud Barak visits the US this week. Barak said he will discuss a wide range of issues with American officials, including resuming peace talks with the Palestinians and a comprehensive peace with the Arab states. But the Palestinians are refusing to return to the negotiating table until Israel agrees to a settlement freeze.

UN Fact-finding Commission Faces Skepticism in Gaza - Edmund Sanders, Los Angeles Times. A novel approach toward injecting international justice into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict got underway Sunday in this embattled enclave, but it left neither side particularly satisfied. Borrowing from the South African reconciliation experience, a United Nations fact-finding commission opened what it said was the first-of-its-kind public hearing to gather witness testimony about alleged war crimes during Israel's 22-day assault on the Gaza Strip in winter. But as it has with past inquiries, the Israeli government has refused to cooperate with the United Nations Human Rights Council fact-finding team, calling it hopelessly biased. A follow-up hearing, to gather testimony from Israeli victims of rocket attacks by the Islamic militant group Hamas, which controls Gaza, will be held in Europe because of Israeli officials' refusal to allow the commission into their country. Around Gaza, skepticism and distrust appear nearly equally high.

End the Spat With Israel - Jackson Diehl, Washington Post opinion. The upheaval in Iran offers the Obama administration a host of fresh foreign policy opportunities. Not the least of them is a chance to creep away from the corner into which it has painted itself in the Arab-Israeli peace process. President Obama began with a broad strategy of simultaneously pressing Israel, the Palestinians and Arab states to take concrete steps toward peace. By the time Iranians took to the streets, it had allowed that broad front to be narrowed to a single point: a standoff with the Israeli government of Binyamin Netanyahu over whether "natural growth" would be allowed in Jewish settlements outside Israel's 1967 borders. Pressuring Israel made sense, at first.

BOOK REVIEWS

The Battlefield Can Be an Unforgiving Teacher - Janet Maslin, New York Times book review of The Unforgiving Minute by Craig M. Mullaney.

Soldiers of Misfortune - James Glanz, New York Times book review of Joker One: A Marine Platoon’s Story of Courage by Donovan Campbell.

A Counterinsurgency Primer - Max Boot, Wall Street Journal book review of The Accidental Guerrilla: Fighting Small Wars in the Midst of a Big One by David Kilcullen.

Reluctant Warriors - The Economist book review of both The Gamble: General David Petraeus and the American Military Adventure in Iraq, 2006-2008 by Thomas Ricks and The Accidental Guerrilla: Fighting Small Wars in the Midst of a Big One by David Kilcullen.

BOOKS

War 2.0: Irregular Warfare in the Information Age - Thomas Rid and Marc Hecker.

War 2.0: Irregular Warfare in the Information Age argues that two intimately connected trends are putting modern armies under huge pressure to adapt: the rise of insurgencies and the rise of the Web. Both in cyberspace and in warfare, the grassroots public has assumed increasing importance in recent years. After the dot-com bubble burst in 2000, Web 2.0 rose from the ashes. This newly interactive and participatory form of the Web promotes and enables offline action. Similarly, after Rumsfeld's attempt to transform the US military into a lean, lethal, computerized force crashed in Iraq in 2003, counterinsurgency rose from the ashes. Counterinsurgency is a social form of war - indeed, the US Army calls it armed social work - in which the local matrix population becomes the center of strategic gravity and public opinion at home the critical vulnerability.

The New Counterinsurgency Era: Transforming the U.S. Military for Modern Wars - David H. Ucko.

Confronting insurgent violence in Iraq and Afghanistan, the US military has recognized the need to "re-learn" counterinsurgency. But how has the Department of Defense with its mixed efforts responded to this new strategic environment? Has it learned anything from past failures? In The New Counterinsurgency Era, David Ucko examines DoD's institutional obstacles and initially slow response to a changing strategic reality.

Journey into Darkness: Genocide in Rwanda - Thomas P. Odom.

In July 1994, Thomas P. Odom was part of the US Embassy team that responded to the Goma refugee crisis. He witnessed the deaths of 70,000 refugees in a single week. In the previous three months of escalating violence, the Rwandan genocide had claimed 800,000 dead. Now, in this vivid and unsettling new book, Odom offers the first insider look at these devastating events before, during, and after the genocide.

Joker One: A Marine Platoon’s Story of Courage - Donovan Campbell.

Donovan Campbell, first as a Marine and then as a writer, shows us that the dominant emotion in war isn’t hatred or anger or fear. It’s love. His story stands as a poignant tribute to his men–their courage, their dedication, their skill, and their love for one another, even unto death.

The Battle for Peace: A Frontline Vision of America's Power and Purpose - Anthony Zinni and Tony Koltz

The intellectual complement to Zinni and Clancy's bestselling Battle Ready (2004), a narrative memoir salted with specific policy recommendations, this volume provides the former US Central Command chief's analysis of America's current global position. Zinni begins by asserting that America's status as "the most powerful nation in the history of the planet" has created a de facto empire. The US has no choice: if it fails to take the lead, nothing significant happens. At the same time, Americans must recognize that, in a global age, there can be no zero-sum games.

The Unforgiving Minute: A Soldier's Education - Craig Mullaney

The Unforgiving Minute is the ultimate's soldier's book - universal in its raw emotion and its understanding of the larger issues of life and death. Mullaney, a master storyteller, plunges the depths of self-doubt, endurance, and courage. The result: a riveting, suspenseful human story, beautifully told. This is a book written under fire - a lyrical, spellbinding tale of war, love, and courage. The Unforgiving Minute is the Three Cups of Tea of soldiering.

Great Powers: America and the World after Bush - Thomas P.M. Barnett

In civilian and military circles alike, The Pentagon’s New Map became one of the most talked about books of 2004. “A combination of Tom Friedman on globalization and Carl von Clausewitz on war, [it is] the red-hot book among the nation’s admirals and generals,” wrote David Ignatius in The Washington Post. Barnett’s second book, Blueprint for Action, demonstrated how to put the first book’s principles to work. Now, in Great Powers, Barnett delivers his most sweeping - and important - book of all.

The Accidental Guerrilla: Fighting Small Wars in the Midst of a Big One - David Kilcullen

A remarkably fresh perspective on the War on Terror. Kilcullen takes us "on the ground" to uncover the face of modern warfare, illuminating both the big global war (the "War on Terrorism") and its relation to the associated "small wars" across the globe: Iraq, Afghanistan, the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Chechnya, Pakistan and North Africa.

The Gamble: General David Petraeus and the American Military Adventure in Iraq, 2006-2008 - Thomas Ricks

Thomas E. Ricks uses hundreds of hours of exclusive interviews with top officers in Iraq and extraordinary on-the-ground reportage to document the inside story of the Iraq War since late 2005 as only he can, examining the events that took place as the military was forced to reckon with itself, the surge was launched, and a very different war began.

Why Vietnam Matters: An Eyewitness Account of Lessons Not Learned - Rufus Phillips

Phillips details how the legendary Edward G. Lansdale helped the South Vietnamese gain and consolidate their independence between 1954 and 1956, and how this later changed to a reliance on American conventional warfare with its highly destructive firepower. He reasons that our failure to understand the Communists, our South Vietnamese allies, or even ourselves took us down the wrong road. In summing up US errors in Vietnam, Phillips draws parallels with the American experience in Iraq and Afghanistan and suggests changes in the US approach. Known for his intellectual integrity and firsthand, long-term knowledge of what went on in Vietnam, the author offers lessons for today in this trenchant account.

Baghdad at Sunrise: A Brigade Commander's War in Iraq - Peter Mansoor

This is a unique contribution to the burgeoning literature on the Iraq war, analyzing the day-to-day performance of a US brigade in Baghdad during 2004-2005. Mansoor uses a broad spectrum of sources to address the military, political and cultural aspects of an operation undertaken with almost no relevant preparation, which tested officers and men to their limits and generated mistakes and misjudgments on a daily basis. The critique is balanced, perceptive and merciless - and Mansoor was the brigade commander. Military history is replete with command memoirs. Most are more or less self-exculpatory. Even the honest ones rarely achieve this level of analysis. The effect is like watching a surgeon perform an operation on himself. Mansoor has been simultaneously a soldier and a scholar, able to synergize directly his military and academic experiences.

The Strongest Tribe: War, Politics, and the Endgame in Iraq - Bing West

From a universally respected combat journalist, a gripping history based on five years of front-line reporting about how the war was turned around - and the choice now facing America. We interpret reality through the clouded prism of our own experience, so it is unsurprising that Bing West sees Iraq through the lens of Vietnam. He served as a Marine officer there, and he thinks politicians and the media caused the American public to turn against a war that could have been won. Now a correspondent for the Atlantic, West has made 15 reporting trips to Iraq over the last six years and is almost as personally invested in the current conflict as he was in Vietnam; this book, his third on Iraq, is his attempt to ensure that the "endgame" in Iraq turns out better than in his last war.

Tell Me How This Ends: General David Petraeus and the Search for a Way Out of Iraq - Linda Robinson

After a series of disastrous missteps in its conduct of the war, the White House in 2006 appointed General David Petraeus as the Commanding General of the coalition forces. Tell Me How This Ends is an inside account of his attempt to turn around a failing war. Linda Robinson conducted extensive interviews with Petraeus and his subordinate commanders and spent weeks with key US and Iraqi divisions. The result is the only book that ties together military operations in Iraq and the internecine political drama that is at the heart of the civil war. Replete with dramatic battles, behind-doors confrontations, and astute analysis, the book tells the full story of the Iraq War’s endgame, and lays out the options that will be facing the next president.

The War Within: A Secret White House History 2006-2008 - Bob Woodward

Woodward interviewed key players, obtained dozens of never-before-published documents, and had nearly three hours of exclusive interviews with President Bush. The result is a stunning, firsthand history of the years from mid-2006, when the White House realizes the Iraq strategy is not working, through the decision to surge another 30,000 US troops in 2007, and into mid-2008, when the war becomes a fault line in the presidential election. As violence in Iraq reaches unnerving levels in 2006, a second front in the war rages at the highest levels of the Bush administration. In his fourth book on President George W. Bush, Bob Woodward takes readers deep inside the tensions, secret debates, unofficial backchannels, distrust and determination within the White House, the Pentagon, the State Department, the intelligence agencies and the US military headquarters in Iraq. With unparalleled intimacy and detail, this gripping account of a president at war describes a period of distress and uncertainty within the US government from 2006 through mid-2008. The White House launches a secret strategy review that excludes the military. General George Casey, the commander in Iraq, believes that President Bush does not understand the war and eventually concludes he has lost the president's confidence. The Joint Chiefs of Staff also conduct a secret strategy review that goes nowhere. On the verge of revolt, they worry that the military will be blamed for a failure in Iraq.

We Are Soldiers Still: A Journey Back to the Battlefields of Vietnam - Harold Moore and Joe Galloway

In their stunning follow-up to the classic bestseller We Were Soldiers Once... and Young, Lt. Gen. Hal Moore and Joe Galloway return to Vietnam and reflect on how the war changed them, their men, their enemies, and both countries - often with surprising results. It would be a monumental task for Moore and Galloway to top their classic 1992 memoir. But they come close in this sterling sequel, which tells the backstory of two of the Vietnam War's bloodiest battles (in which Moore participated as a lieutenant colonel), their first book and a 1993 ABC-TV documentary that brought them back to the battlefield. Moore's strong first-person voice reviews the basics of the November 1965 battles, part of the 34-day Battle of the Ia Drang Valley. Among other things, Moore and Galloway (who covered the battle for UPI) offer portraits of two former enemy commanders, generals Nguyen Huu An and Chu Huy Man, whom the authors met - and bonded with - nearly three decades after the battle. This book proves again that Moore is an exceptionally thoughtful, compassionate and courageous leader (he was one of a handful of army officers who studied the history of the Vietnam wars before he arrived) and a strong voice for reconciliation and for honoring the men with whom he served.

In a Time of War: The Proud and Perilous Journey of West Point' Class of 2002 - Bill Murphy

The West Point cadets Murphy follows through their baptism by fire are an admirable sample of young American men and women: intelligent, ambitious and intensely patriotic. Most come from career military families and hold conservative opinions. Murphy describes their four years at West Point with respect even when discussing their love lives and marriages. All yearn for battle, and most get their wish. The book's best passages describe the confusion of moving to Iraq or Afghanistan and fighting insurgents, for which they lack both training and equipment. All feel something is not right but concentrate on the job at hand; some inevitably die or are grievously wounded.

Iraq and the Evolution of American Strategy - Steven Metz

Today the US military is more nimble, mobile, and focused on rapid responses against smaller powers than ever before. One could argue that the Gulf War and the postwar standoff with Saddam Hussein hastened needed military transformation and strategic reassessments in the post–Cold War era. But the preoccupation with Iraq also mired the United States in the Middle East and led to a bloody occupation. What will American strategy look like after US troops leave Iraq? Metz concludes that the United States has a long-standing, continuing problem “developing sound assumptions when the opponent operates within a different psychological and cultural framework.” He sees a pattern of misjudgments about Saddam and Iraq based on Western cultural and historical bias and a pervasive faith in the superiority of America’s worldview and institutions. This myopia contributed to America being caught off guard by Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990, then underestimating his longevity, and finally miscalculating the likelihood of a stable and democratic Iraq after he was toppled. With lessons for all readers concerned about America’s role in the world, Dr. Metz’s important new work will especially appeal to scholars and students of strategy and international security studies, as well as to military professionals and DOD civilians. With a foreword by Colin S. Gray.