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안녕하세요 David Ignatius 기자입니다.

Articles by David Ignatius

[David Ignatius] What was Trump afraid of in Russia scandal?

ViewpointsDec 6, 2017

It’s a truism of Washington scandals that it’s not the initial actions that lead to legal disaster, but the attempt to cover them up. It’s possible that is the case with Friday’s indictment of former national security adviser Michael Flynn -- and in the broader investigation of the Trump team’s contacts with Russia. But there is much we still do not know.　This sweater has been unraveling from a thin initial thread. When I reported on Jan. 12 the phone calls between Flynn and Russian Ambassador S
[David Ignatius] As America steps back from the global stage, China pursues a starring role

ViewpointsNov 29, 2017

The friendly words exchanged between Presidents Trump and Xi Jinping this month softened the edge of a Chinese economic and military buildup that a recent study commissioned by the Pentagon described as “perhaps the most ambitious grand strategy undertaken by a single nation-state in modern times.”At the Beijing summit on Nov. 9, Xi repeated his usual congenial injunction for “win-win cooperation,” and Trump responded in kind, calling Xi “a very special man.” Trump also complained about the Chin
[David Ignatius] How to protect against fake ‘facts’

ViewpointsNov 26, 2017

Amid the slithering mess of problems that emerged in 2017, the one that bothers me most is that people don’t seem to know what’s true anymore. “Facts” this year got put in quotation marks.　All the other political difficulties of the Donald Trump era are subsumed in this one. If we aren’t sure what’s true, how can we act to make things better? If we don’t know where we are on the map, how do we know which way to move? Democracy assumes a well-informed citizenry that argues about solutions -- not
[David Ignatius] A beleaguered Tillerson is still at the table

ViewpointsNov 23, 2017

A funny thing happened to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on the way to the exit door: He didn’t leave. He may be “Dead Man Walking,” as many Washington analysts assume. Yet he’s still pursuing the same list of quiet but mostly correct diplomatic goals as when he took the job 10 months ago.　Tillerson has had a catastrophically bad encounter with official Washington. The White House disdains him; the State Department resents him; the press corps mostly scorns him. Tillerson presses on as if he d
[David Ignatius] Saudi political explosions risk collateral damage

ViewpointsNov 20, 2017

Nearly two weeks after the double political explosion that rocked Riyadh, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman appears to be doing damage control in ways that may help stabilize Saudi Arabia and the region.　The first bombshell was the Nov. 4 arrest on corruption charges of 201 prominent Saudis, including princes and government ministers. Now MBS, as the 32-year-old crown prince is known, is beginning a resolution process that may settle many of these cases out of court.　A senior Saudi official told
[David Ignatius] Trump makes America retreat from the world

ViewpointsNov 17, 2017

As President Trump ends his Asia trip, he might sum up the 12-day journey with a revision of the remark attributed to Julius Caesar: Veni, vidi, blandivi. I came, I saw, I flattered.　Trump’s trip was closer to a pilgrimage than a projection of power. The president rarely explained details of US policy. Instead, he mostly asked other leaders for help, lauded their virtues, and embraced their worldviews.　Along the adulation tour, Trump spoke of his “really extraordinary” relationship with Japanese
[David Ignatius] Is Lebanon’s leader a pawn in Saudi Arabia’s proxy war?

ViewpointsNov 14, 2017

Former Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri is being held by Saudi authorities under what Lebanese sources say amounts to house arrest in Riyadh, apparently as part of the Saudi campaign to squeeze Iran and its Lebanese ally, Hezbollah.　A startling account of Hariri’s forced detention was provided Friday by knowledgeable sources in Beirut. It offers important new evidence of the tactics used by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to bolster his rule by mobilizing anti-Iran sentiment at home an
[David Ignatius] Let Mueller unravel Russian meddling

ViewpointsNov 2, 2017

Has there ever been a covert action that backfired as disastrously as Russia’s attempt to meddle in the 2016 US presidential campaign?Granted, we know all the reasons Moscow is gloating: Donald Trump is president; America is divided and confused; Russia’s propagandization of “fake news” is now repeated by people around the world as evidence that nothing is believable and all information is (as in Russia) manipulated and mendacious.　But against this cynical strategy there now stands a process emb
[David Ignatius] Russia’s worrisome push to control cyberspace

ViewpointsOct 26, 2017

Russia’s cybermeddling in the 2016 US presidential election has been accompanied by what US and European experts describe as a worrisome Kremlin campaign to rewrite the rules for global cyberspace.　A draft of a Russian proposal for a new “United Nations Convention on Cooperation in Combating Information Crimes” was recently shown to me by a security expert who obtained a copy. The 54-page document includes 72 proposed articles, covering collection of internet traffic by authorities, “codes of co
[David Ignatius] Raqqa is a reminder of US military might

ViewpointsOct 22, 2017

Looking at photographs of the ruined, desolate streets of what was once the Islamic State group’s capital of Raqqa is a reminder of the overwhelming, pitilessly effective military power of the United States.Perhaps it’s a tribute to the inevitable nature of American force, once it‘s engaged, that the fall of Raqqa this week provoked so little public discussion. Commentators focused on whether President Trump had dissed the parents of America’s fallen warriors, but they barely seemed to notice th
[David Ignatius] Trump‘s personality and his Asian hosts

ViewpointsOct 19, 2017

As President Trump prepares to head to Asia next month for his most important overseas trip yet, foreign intelligence services are undoubtedly trying to assemble personality profiles to explain this unconventional, risk-taking, domineering president to the leaders he will meet. How will they describe Trump? Probably not with the same hyperbole we sometimes use in our daily news commentary. Foreign governments aren’t as easily shocked or offended as journalists. They‘re used to bullying autocrats
[David Ignatius] Trump’s foreign policy lacks clarity

ViewpointsOct 12, 2017

Critics have complained about US President Trump’s bombast on foreign policy, but some GOP insiders worry about a less visible problem -- a hollowed-out bureaucracy that has been slow to develop and implement strategy.Skeptics say that on major issues -- Afghanistan, Iran, Syria, Iraq, Russia -- the Trump administration hasn’t explained clear, systematic plans for achieving results. Even where there seems to be a coherent diplomatic strategy, as on North Korea, the president often undercuts it w
[David Ignatius] Trump’s geopolitical straddle in Iran

ViewpointsOct 10, 2017

Various cultures have different phrases for expressing the idea of having it both ways at once. “To take a swim and not get wet” is an Albanian proverb. Poles talk about “having the cookie and eating it.” Iranians want “both God and the sugar dates.”The Trump administration has been weighing a contemporary geopolitical version of this straddle. Hard-liners have been urging the president next week to decertify the Iran nuclear agreement but insist that he wants to strengthen the deal, not break i
[David Ignatius] On North Korea, Trump needs to stop fulminating and start dealing

ViewpointsSept 28, 2017

Top US officials have said repeatedly that America is seeking a diplomatic solution to the nuclear crisis with North Korea. But President Trump‘s insulting comments toward North Korean leader Kim Jong-un appear to have made such a negotiated settlement more difficult.In the chaotic government-by-Twitter atmosphere of the Trump administration, no senior leader has publicly questioned whether the president’s trash talk about “Rocket Man” and his threat to “totally destroy” North Korea have undermi
[David Ignatius] US must think outside the box on NK

ViewpointsSept 22, 2017

The Trump administration often talks about North Korea policy as if it’s an on-off switch. President Trump thundered Tuesday that the US will “totally destroy” North Korea to defend itself and its allies. But Defense Secretary James Mattis blandly insisted the next day that it’s “still a diplomatically led effort.”Somewhere in this maze of public statements-including Thursday’s announcement of new economic sanctions on North Korea -- there’s a nuanced American policy. But the seeming binary opti