Section: The Atlantic (USA)
Photos of the Week: 5/30-6/5
This week we have images of renewed fighting in Ukraine, people trying to capture “Manhattanhenge”, a simulated bomb attack in Israel, a robotic teacher in China, attacks on gay rights activists in Moscow, Parkour among Greek ruins in Libya, the rescue of a suicidal man in China, a Red Panda in Italy, and much more.This article was...
The Myth of a Borderless Internet
Sang Tan / AP Almost a decade ago now, McDonald’s made a seemingly innocuous decision. On the side of Happy Meals distributed in Morocco in 2008, it put a small map of the region. The map showed a border between the disputed territory of Western Sahara and Morocco—a vision of reality that differed from, among other accounts, Morocco’s...
What If the Allies Had Lost World War I?
An early-morning attack by British forces on the Western Front in 1917 (AP) In the spring of 2015, my undergraduate son and I drove the length of the 1914-1918 Western Front, from the British battlefields in Flanders through the French zone in Champagne and Lorraine to the American cemeteries and monuments: Chateau-Thierry, St. Quentin, Belleau...
The Clock Finally Runs Out for FIFA
Leonhard Foeger / Reuters Imagine this: A shadowy multinational syndicate, sprawling across national borders but keeping its business quiet. Founded in the early 20th century, it has survived a tumultuous century, gradually expanding its power. It cuts deals with national governments and corporations alike, and has a hand in a range of...
The Art of Avoiding War
DeAgostini / Getty The Scythians were nomadic horsemen who dominated a vast realm of the Pontic steppe north of the Black Sea, in present-day Ukraine and southern Russia, from the seventh century to the third century b.c. Unlike other ancient peoples who left not a trace, the Scythians continued to haunt and terrify long after they were gone....
What People Around the World Dream About
“To be an artist is to live inside a lucid dream.” – New York, USA (Roc Morin) The first thing I learned is: Everybody flies. Consider the surly taxi driver I met in Ukraine who, when asked what he dreamed of at night, responded, “I jump and then I fly—higher than the trees, higher than the trolley wires.” “I think when I die,”...
Why Is John Kerry in Russia?
Joshua Roberts / Reuters Tuesday seemed like a particularly strange day for Secretary of State John Kerry to pay the highest-level U.S. visit to Russia in nearly two years. The ceasefire in Ukraine hasn’t stopped the daily violence between pro-Russian separatists and Ukrainian troops. The Russian-backed regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria is...
China and Russia Grow Even Closer
Russian President Vladimir Putin, right, gestures while speaking with Chinese President Xi Jinping, second left, watching the Victory Parade marking the 70th anniversary of the surrender of Nazi Germany in World War II, in Red Square, Moscow, Russia, Saturday, May 9, 2015. (Alexander Zemlianichenko/AP) On Saturday, Russia staged a grand...
What Republicans Can Learn From British Conservatives
Luke MacGregor / Reuters Stephen Harper in Canada. Tony Abbott in Australia. John Key in New Zealand. And now, impressively re-elected, a second-term David Cameron in the United Kingdom. Center-right leaders are in charge of every one of America’s closest English-speaking allies. Only in the United States does the liberal left govern. With...
Why Russia Celebrates V-E Day on a Different Day Than Everyone Else
Field Marshall Wilhelm Keitel signing the German surrender in Berlin (National Archives) Seventy years ago today, Germany’s surrender to the Allies took effect, marking the formal end of World War II in Europe. Or did it? Americans, Brits, and the French mark the date of the Allied Victory in Europe (V-E Day) on May 8; Russians celebrate...
