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COMMENTARY / World / SENTAKU MAGAZINE

Mar 26, 2012

Tapping into oceanic energy

The serious physical damage caused by the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant disaster, following the 3/11 earthquake and tsunami, has reminded Japan all the more of its acute shortage of natural energy sources and the need for developing alternative sources. This has led scientists and private corporations...

COMMENTARY

Mar 26, 2012

Cyberspace: new face of war in the 21st century

By Cesar Chelala

For the past few years, there has been an explosion of ways in which countries can engage in destructive behavior. The use of cyberspace as a venue of battle has changed the nature of conventional warfare. This poses problems in terms of response to those threats as well as how to develop international...

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK

Mar 26, 2012

Costs of a policy of profligacy with foreign lives

By Hiroaki Sato

In the early hours of March 11, Sunday, a U.S. soldier went on a rampage in a village in Panjway, southwest of Kandahar, Afghanistan. He went from one mud house to another, shot, stabbed, and burned 16 villagers. Or so it has been reported.

COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT

Mar 25, 2012

Right and justice shine through the infernal prism of wartime Poland

By Roger Pulvers

One of my most treasured possessions is an old photograph. Taken in 1910, in Krakow, Poland, it shows five generations of my ancestors on my mother's side, beginning with my great-great-grandfather, Joseph Pinkus Krengel, who was born in 1818.

COMMENTARY

Mar 24, 2012

China must rein in N. Korea

By Ralph Cossa

Now what? Just when we thought things were getting better, North Korea pulled the rug out from under everyone, including itself, by announcing a planned satellite launch to commemorate Great Leader Kim Il Sung's 100th birthday celebration.

COMMENTARY

Mar 23, 2012

Bowing out with a farewell of great expectation

By Tom Plate

What was most amazing to Westerners at least -and perhaps, especially, to the Chinese people — was that his comments were broadcast live on official China TV. After all, his official observations weren't exactly pretty. Here is the back-story.

COMMENTARY / World

Mar 22, 2012

NATO's Libyan war lessons

By Ken Gude and John D. Podesta

NATO's intervention in Libya one year ago helped to avert a humanitarian catastrophe and created the conditions for Libya's citizens to end Col. Moammar Gadhafi's dictatorship. The military operation highlighted important improvements in European leadership since the Bosnian debacle in the 1990's, but...

COMMENTARY

Mar 22, 2012

Pinpointing the causes of the U.S. economic crisis

By Robert Samuelson

Four years after the onset of the financial crisis — in March 2008 Bear Stearns was rescued from failure — we still lack a clear understanding of the underlying causes. Hundreds of studies and books have given us an increasingly detailed picture of what happened without conclusively answering why....

COMMENTARY

Mar 22, 2012

China's military buildup breeds distrust

By Michael Richardson

Since China announced another big rise in its military spending earlier this month, Chinese officials in Beijing and diplomats posted in Asia-Pacific countries have been trying to spread an orchestrated message to the region: Don't be alarmed.

COMMENTARY / World

Mar 21, 2012

Can the world's poor nations save the rest of us?

By Olivier Ray and Jean-michel Severino

Events in 2012 so far have confirmed a new global dissymmetry. Caught between unprecedented financial insecurity and a somber economic outlook, the rich OECD countries and their middle classes fear geopolitical weakening and downward social mobility. In much of Asia, Africa and Latin America, however,...

COMMENTARY / World

Mar 21, 2012

Goldman Sachs has a long history of duping its clients

By William D. Cohan

Greg Smith doesn't know the half of it.

COMMENTARY

Mar 21, 2012

Nearing the end of tyranny?

By Hugh Cortazzi

President Vladimir Putin in Russia, President Bashar Assad in Syria and President Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe are detested by many of their fellow countrymen who would like to see them overthrown and tried for human rights abuses. They depend on a close coterie of guards and aides who have to be kept happy....

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

A sinkhole in Yashio, which emerged in January, was triggered by a ruptured, aging sewer pipe. Authorities worry that similar sections of infrastructure across the country are also at risk of corrosion.

That sinking feeling: Japan’s aging sewers are an infrastructure time bomb

By Alex K.T. Martin

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Smile! It’s ‘Sanrio Time,’ now and ever after

Smile! It’s ‘Sanrio Time,’ now and ever after

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