The great Austrian novelist Joseph Roth died a few months before the Hitlerian cataclysm that he foresaw. At his end, in 1939, Roth was living in exile in Paris, penniless and alcoholic, broken by the extinguishment of the mitteleuropa of his childhood. Roth had been born in 1894 in a place called Brody, a small town in what was then the Austro-Hungarian empire but is now Ukraine. Today, this little town of Roth’s childhood is under threat once more.Roth is best-known for his novel , chronicling the end of the Habsburg empire—a tragedy as far as he was concerned. But , another of his...…The great Austrian novelist Joseph Roth died a few months before the Hitlerian cataclysm that he foresaw. At his end, in 1939, Roth was living in exile in Paris, penniless and alcoholic, broken by the extinguishment of the mitteleuropa of his childhood. Roth had been born in 1894 in a place called Brody, a small town in what was then the Austro-Hungarian empire but is now Ukraine. Today, this little town of Roth’s childhood is under threat once more.Roth is best-known for his novel , chronicling the end of the Habsburg empire—a tragedy as far as he was concerned. But , another of his...WW…

Joe Biden begins his first full day as the 46th president of the United States today with as daunting a list of foreign-policy challenges as almost any of his predecessors. After four years of Donald Trump, the new administration must overcome skepticism about America’s ability to deal with the great tests facing the world, including the rise of China as a 21st-century superpower, the spread of nuclear weapons, and the onslaught of man-made climate change. To this list can be added a new issue: patching up the transatlantic alliance.Last month, with Biden’s inauguration just weeks away, the...…Joe Biden begins his first full day as the 46th president of the United States today with as daunting a list of foreign-policy challenges as almost any of his predecessors. After four years of Donald Trump, the new administration must overcome skepticism about America’s ability to deal with the great tests facing the world, including the rise of China as a 21st-century superpower, the spread of nuclear weapons, and the onslaught of man-made climate change. To this list can be added a new issue: patching up the transatlantic alliance.Last month, with Biden’s inauguration just weeks away, the...WW…

. That is, at least, the dominant feeling in many global capitals as they adjust to the reality that Joe Biden will soon be president of the United States and, more to the point, that Donald Trump will not be: At least for now, NATO is safe; the transatlantic alliance is safe; global free trade is safe—the world as we knew it is safe. The grown-ups are moving back in. Life can be breathed back into the Paris climate accord, the Iran nuclear agreement, and even the deflated idea of multilateralism itself. For those who believe in such things, the removal of the most powerful figure in recent...…. That is, at least, the dominant feeling in many global capitals as they adjust to the reality that Joe Biden will soon be president of the United States and, more to the point, that Donald Trump will not be: At least for now, NATO is safe; the transatlantic alliance is safe; global free trade is safe—the world as we knew it is safe. The grown-ups are moving back in. Life can be breathed back into the Paris climate accord, the Iran nuclear agreement, and even the deflated idea of multilateralism itself. For those who believe in such things, the removal of the most powerful figure in recent...WW…

“The cretinous stupidity of it!” snaps the tragic hero in Joseph Roth’s The Radetzky March as he faces up to his likely death in a duel over his wife’s honor. He did not want the fight and no longer loves his wife anyway, but the “stupid, steely law” of honor that bound his cavalry regiment left him no escape. In frustration, he sighs: “I don’t have the strength to run away from this stupid duel. I will become a hero out of sheer idiocy.”Here we are, then, back to the cretinous stupidity of the Brexit conundrum—a conundrum created by a law as steely as Roth’s code of honor. The law is this:...…“The cretinous stupidity of it!” snaps the tragic hero in Joseph Roth’s The Radetzky March as he faces up to his likely death in a duel over his wife’s honor. He did not want the fight and no longer loves his wife anyway, but the “stupid, steely law” of honor that bound his cavalry regiment left him no escape. In frustration, he sighs: “I don’t have the strength to run away from this stupid duel. I will become a hero out of sheer idiocy.”Here we are, then, back to the cretinous stupidity of the Brexit conundrum—a conundrum created by a law as steely as Roth’s code of honor. The law is this:...WW…

T, somehow captured the man and the moment—the end of one era, and the beginning of another. It was January 2017, and then–British Prime Minister Theresa May was in the White House, the first foreign leader to visit the new president of the United States, Donald Trump. For May, the trip had gone well: Pleasantries had been exchanged, faux pas avoided, commitments to NATO and the special relationship gleaned. Then came the press conference.“Mr. President,” the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg, called on by May, began, “you’ve said before that torture works; you’ve praised Russia; you’ve said you want...…T, somehow captured the man and the moment—the end of one era, and the beginning of another. It was January 2017, and then–British Prime Minister Theresa May was in the White House, the first foreign leader to visit the new president of the United States, Donald Trump. For May, the trip had gone well: Pleasantries had been exchanged, faux pas avoided, commitments to NATO and the special relationship gleaned. Then came the press conference.“Mr. President,” the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg, called on by May, began, “you’ve said before that torture works; you’ve praised Russia; you’ve said you want...WW…

“H John le Carré wrote of his fictional Soviet mole, Bill Haydon, in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. Haydon had just been unmasked as a double agent at the heart of Britain’s secret service, one whose treachery was motivated by animus, not so much to England but to America. “It’s an aesthetic judgment as much as anything,” Haydon explained, before hastily adding: “Partly a moral one, of course.”I thought of this as I watched the scenes of protest and violence over the killing of George Floyd spread across the United States and then here in Europe and beyond. The whole thing looked so ugly at...…“H John le Carré wrote of his fictional Soviet mole, Bill Haydon, in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. Haydon had just been unmasked as a double agent at the heart of Britain’s secret service, one whose treachery was motivated by animus, not so much to England but to America. “It’s an aesthetic judgment as much as anything,” Haydon explained, before hastily adding: “Partly a moral one, of course.”I thought of this as I watched the scenes of protest and violence over the killing of George Floyd spread across the United States and then here in Europe and beyond. The whole thing looked so ugly at...WW…