by Laura Belmonte
Last October, a bill was introduced in the Ugandan parliament that would make homosexuality punishable by life imprisonment or even death. The bill also calls for the extradition of Ugandans who engage in homosexual sex in other countries and for criminal penalties for individuals, media, or non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that support lesbian, gay, bisexual, and [...]
Posted in Africa, Human Rights, International Organizations, Internationl law and treaties, Post-Cold War: 1991-2001, Uganda, World Health Organization | No Comments »
by Molly Wood
I grew up in Richmond, Virginia, and even though I have not lived there for many years, I still visit regularly. I often think that my decision to become a historian stems in part from the stories of my family history told to me by grandparents and other relatives. I learned from my grandmother, for [...]
Posted in Afghanistan War: 2001-present, Iraq War: 2003-present, United States, Vietnam: 1961-1975, World War I: 1914-1918, World War II: 1939-1945 | No Comments »
by William Glenn Gray
Germans have chosen to work; Greeks have chosen leisure. For this reason, Germans are furious with Greece for accumulating an unsustainable debt burden and thereby undermining the solidity of the European currency. But the self-righteous anger in Berlin may itself call into question the political basis of the Euro.
Posted in European Union, Foreign aid, Gerald Ford administration: 1974-1977, Germany, Greece, International Economic Relations, International Organizations, International Trade and Economics, Western Europe | No Comments »
by John Prados
In Afghanistan at the moment (February 2010), U.S. Marines, allied troops, and Afghan government soldiers are embarked on an offensive at a town called Marja in Helmand province. American commander-in-chief General Stanley A. McChrystal here makes the first expression of the strategy that underlies the appeal for reinforcements that led to the Obama administration “surge” [...]
Posted in Afghanistan, Afghanistan War: 2001-present, Barack Obama administration: 2009-present, Early Cold War: 1945-1961, Historiography, Military affaris, Terrorism, Theory and Ideas | No Comments »
by Mary Dudziak
As the Obama Administration moves (slowly) toward repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, one argument in opposition is that the nation is at war, and significant changes in the military should not take place during wartime. One response to that point is that all hands are needed during heightened military deployments, and it harms American [...]
Posted in Barack Obama administration: 2009-present, Bill Clinton administartion: 1993-2001, George W. Bush administration: 2001-2008, Military affaris, Terrorism | No Comments »
by John Prados
We are told that history plays as tragedy and repeats as farce. But perhaps that is changing. In the summer of 2007 President George W. Bush invoked the Vietnam analogy to justify an equally or more tragic war in Iraq. And in the West Point speech announcing his new strategy for Afghanistan, President Barack Obama [...]
Posted in Afghanistan, Afghanistan War: 2001-present, Barack Obama administration: 2009-present, Terrorism, Uncategorized, Vietnam, Vietnam: 1945-1961, Vietnam: 1961-1975 | No Comments »
by Molly Wood
In October 2007, presidential candidate Barack Obama promised a new approach to American foreign policy. “It’s time to make diplomacy a top priority,” he announced. “Instead of shuttering consulates, we need to open them in the tough and hopeless corners of the world. Instead of having more Americans serving in military bands than the diplomatic [...]
Posted in Afghanistan War: 2001-present, Barack Obama administration: 2009-present, Iraq War: 2003-present, Post-9/11: 2001-present, State Department, Theodore Roosevelt administration: 1901-1909, Uncategorized | No Comments »
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news
7/5/10: SHAFR Member Robert K. Brigham Nominated for AHA Council-Teaching Division read more…
6/10/10: SHAFR Conference to held June 24-26, 2010 read more…
5/10/10: SHAFR Nominating Committee Issues Call for Nominations read more…
9/1/09: SHAFR Opportunities in 2010 read more…
Featured this month
by Brian Etheridge
SHAFR.org is proud to offer its second roundtable. In recognition of the 60th anniversary of the outbreak of the Korean War, we asked some of the most accomplished scholars on the conflict to reflect on the war’s significance for the world today. We are honored to publish essays by William Stueck and James Matray on this important anniversary. We are also pleased to publish an essay by Brian Clancy, a member of SHAFR’s Teaching Committee, on teaching the Korean War to students.
For the first time, Passport, the newsletter of SHAFR, has agreed to publish these commentaries in a future issue. Along with the original pieces, the editors of Passport have also agreed to publish some of the most thoughtful comments on these essays by our readers. Commenting on these works is easily done by logging into the system through the portal at the top of the right column. If you have questions about how to make a comment, please email the web editor.
Below are documents provided by the Teaching Committee in honor of the publication of this roundtable.
Chinese Foreign Ministry: Why China Intervened in North Korea (1950) part I
Chinese Foreign Ministry: Why China Intervened in North Korea (1950) part II
American Foreign Policy, Basic Documents, Volume II, pp. 1-25
Posted in China, East Asia, Harry Truman administration: 1945-1953, Korean War: 1950-1953, North Korea, Op-Eds, Roundtable, South Korea | No Comments »
by James Matray
On 25 June 2010, we will commemorate the sixtieth anniversary of the beginning of the conventional phase of the Korean War when Communist forces staged a massive military offensive southward across the 38th parallel to reunite the nation. At first blush, this event would seem to provide few lessons or legacies still relevant twenty years after the Soviet-American contest for global hegemony ceased to define international politics. The United States today struggles to find a strategy to eliminate the use of terror as a political weapon and then unite the world behind its implementation. Understanding the origins, course, and consequences of the Korean War in fact can provide meaningful guidance for world leaders in pursuit of international peace and stability in at least two important ways. First, Korea’s war demonstrates the primacy of nationalism and local circumstances as the forces that decide events in human history. Second, this conflict confirms how flawed leaders act on erroneous assumptions and dubious expectations to make decisions resulting in unwanted and often disastrous outcomes. Proving both points, President Harry S. Truman publicly declared on 27 June 1950 that “communism has passed beyond the use of subversion to conquer independent nations and will now use armed invasion and war.” This same profound detachment from reality afflicted his counterparts in Moscow, Beijing, Pyongyang, and Seoul, leaving Korea divided and in ruins. Read more…
Posted in China, East Asia, Harry Truman administration: 1945-1953, Korean War: 1950-1953, North Korea, Op-Eds, Roundtable, South Korea | No Comments »
by William Stueck
Anniversaries of wars invite reflection, but since wars are often complex in nature and ambiguous in legacy the question of what exactly to reflect on can be difficult to resolve. When it comes to Korea, for example, we could dwell upon the following facts: it was a hideously destructive conflict, especially for the Korean people, some three million of whom died; it was made possible by the division of the peninsula into two hostile parts, the Republic of Korea (ROK) in the South and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) in the North, and the United States played a pivotal role in that development; from the start of its occupation of half the peninsula in September 1945, the United States supported repressive right-wing groups peopled for the most part by recent collaborators with the Japanese; US intervention in June 1950 prevented the reunification of a country that had been one for many centuries but remains dangerously divided to this day; a fair portion of the war’s destruction was produced by American carpet-bombing of North Korea, which became increasingly indiscriminate from November 1950 onward; the war taught lessons to American leaders that helped produce the disastrous commitment to South Vietnam during the following decade. Certainly these unpleasant truths deserve more than passing attention, and I am confident that other commentators in this forum will give them their due. But since I am on balance a glass-half-full kind of guy, I choose to dwell on a couple of positives: first, that once the armistice was concluded on July 27, 1953, the shooting never resumed on a large scale and, second, that what the United States saved through its intervention, the ROK, has developed into a stable, vibrant, and democratic entity that has earned the respect and admiration of the rest of the world. Read more…
Posted in China, East Asia, Harry Truman administration: 1945-1953, Korean War: 1950-1953, North Korea, Op-Eds, Roundtable, South Korea | No Comments »
by Brian Clancy
It is exciting to think that our roundtable commemorating the 60th anniversary of the Korean War will attract a rich cross-section of educators and students seeking to better understand the conflict. I have a personal teaching connection to the “Land of the Morning Calm.” You see, before I entered graduate school, Korea was my home for two years (Koreans rarely use the term South Korea). As a school teacher, I worked, played, and lived among my gracious hosts in Seoul and Uijong-Bu. While there, I took advantage of the opportunities to discuss the war with Koreans, western diplomats, American soldiers, and with Commonwealth veterans as they toured old battlefields. Today, as a member of the SHAFR Teaching Committee, I’d like to share a few lessons I drew from the experience, as well as a few teaching tools I’ve used to explain the war to my own students. Read more…
Posted in China, East Asia, Harry Truman administration: 1945-1953, Korean War: 1950-1953, North Korea, Op-Eds, Roundtable, South Korea | No Comments »
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