Reality Is A Powerful Solvent.

History Always Happens To Us And Nothing Ever Stays The Same.

I Don't Believe That One Should Have One-size-fits-all Moral Rules For International Political Action.

The American Financial And Military Commitment Really Only Kicks In With Korea. Not That Korea Was The Real Game For The Americans; Their Real Fear Was That This Was Just The Prelude To A Second Korea In Germany. We Now Know From The Soviet Archives That The Last Thing Stalin Was Going To Do Was Start A War In Central Europe. The Americans Didn't Know That, And It Was The Fear That He Might Which Transformed Nato From A Sort Of Shell Game Into A Real Military Alliance. That Total Commitment Basically Transformed The Marshal Plan Into Military Aid.

The People Whose Necks Hurt When I Write About The Middle East Tend To Live In Brooklyn Or Boca Raton: The Kind Of Zionist Who Pays Another Man To Live In Israel For Him. I Have Nothing But Contempt For Such People.

It's Important To Remember That World War Ii Was Experienced Very Much As A Continuity In That Sense. Most Of World War Ii In Most Of Europe Wasn't A War; It Was An Occupation. The War Was At The Beginning And The End, Except In Germany And The Soviet Union, And Even There Really Only At The End. So The Rest Of Time It's An Occupation, Which In Some Ways Was Experienced As An Extension Of The Interwar Period. World War Ii Was Simply An Extreme Form, In A Whole New Key, Of The Disruption Of Normal Life That Began In 1914.