William Astore
William J. Astore is a retired lieutenant colonel (USAF), who has taught at the Air Force Academy and the Naval Postgraduate School, and now teaches History at the Pennsylvania College of Technology. He welcomes reader comments at wjastore@gmail.com.
Articles by this author
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Views Monday, January 28, 2019 The U.S. Military’s Lost Wars One of the finest military memoirs of any generation is Defeat Into Victory, British Field Marshal Sir William Slim’s perceptive account of World War II’s torturous Burma campaign, which ended in a resounding victory over Japan. When America’s generals write their memoirs about their never-ending... Read more |
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Views Thursday, October 25, 2018 Why American Leaders Persist in Waging Losing Wars As America enters the 18th year of its war in Afghanistan and its 16th in Iraq, the war on terror continues in Yemen , Syria, and parts of Africa, including Libya, Niger , and Somalia . Meanwhile, the Trump administration threatens yet more war, this time with Iran . (And given these last years,... Read more |
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Views Monday, August 20, 2018 Why Can’t We Just Play Ball? As long as I can remember, I’ve been a sports fan. As long as I can remember, I’ve been interested in the military. Until recently, I experienced those as two separate and distinct worlds. While I was in the military -- I served for 20 years as an officer in the U.S. Air Force -- I did, of course,... Read more |
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Views Monday, June 04, 2018 The Military-Industrial Complex Strikes (Out) Again Did you know the U.S. Air Force is working on a new stealth bomber ? Don’t blame yourself if you didn’t, since the project is so secret that most members of Congress aren’t privy to the details. (Talk about stealthy!) Known as the B-21 Raider , after General Doolittle’s Raiders of World War II fame... Read more |
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Views Thursday, March 15, 2018 The Fog of America's Phony War Overseas, the United States is engaged in real wars in which bombs are dropped, missiles are launched, and people (generally not Americans) are killed, wounded, uprooted, and displaced . Yet here at home, there’s nothing real about those wars. Here, it’s phony war all the way. In the last 17 years... Read more |
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Views Monday, February 05, 2018 Our Enemy, Ourselves Whether the rationale is the need to wage a war on terror involving 76 countries or renewed preparations for a struggle against peer competitors Russia and China (as Defense Secretary James Mattis suggested recently while introducing America’s new National Defense Strategy ), the U.S. military is... Read more |
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Views Tuesday, September 12, 2017 The American Military: Out Everywhere and Winning Nowhere When it comes to the “ world’s greatest military ,” the news has been shocking. Two fast U.S. Navy ships colliding with slow-moving commercial vessels with tragic loss of life. An Air Force that has been in the air continuously for years and yet doesn’t have enough pilots to fly its combat jets... Read more |
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Views Friday, July 14, 2017 Preparing for Doomsday: A Shelter-in-Place Mentality Is the New American Normal Has there ever been a nation as dedicated to preparing for doomsday as the United States? If that’s a thought that hasn’t crossed your mind, maybe it’s because you didn’t spend part of your life inside Cheyenne Mountain. That's a tale I’ll get to soon, but first let me mention America’s “ doomsday... Read more |
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Views Tuesday, June 06, 2017 America’s Real Red Scare: The Slow-Motion Collapse of the American Empire Jump into your time machine and let me transport you back to another age. It’s May 2001 and the Atlantic Monthly has just arrived in the mail. I’m tantalized by the cover article. “Russia is finished,” the magazine announces. The subtitle minces no words: “The unstoppable descent into social... Read more |
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Views Thursday, April 13, 2017 What Does an "America-First" Foreign Policy Actually Mean? What does an “America-first” foreign policy look like under President Donald Trump? As a start, forget the ancient label of “isolationism.” With the end of Trump’s first 100 days approaching, it looks more like a military-first policy aimed at achieving global hegemony, which means it’s a potential... Read more |