On June 29, 1950, the U.S. launched its first ever air strikes on the North Korean capital, Pyongyang, marking the start of what would become the longest conflict in history between two industrial powers. Four decades later, the end of the Cold War in 1989 and the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991 marked the beginning of a new phase of the conflict, with a new unipolar world order centered on the power of the U.S. and Western world leaving North Korea in unprecedented isolation. N...

Atrocity fabrication – the invention and reporting of atrocities committed by an adversary without knowledge that they ever occurred – has a centuries-long history at the heart of propaganda and power politics as an effective means of moving public and international opinion. Its use can provide pretext for a range of hostile measures against its targets, transforming in the public eye wars of unprovoked aggression into wars of liberation of the oppressed, or turning blockades to starve ene...

World War in Syria answers questions that will have continued relevance beyond the country’s borders for years to come. "Impressive in its scholarship, pondered in its judgements, above all searing in its dissection of Western powers' war on Syria waged over many decades, the book is a must-have on the bookshelves of any serious fair-minded student of Syria." --Peter Ford, British Ambassador to Syria from 2003 to 2006 "The most detailed history of the war in Syria so far, providing a richn...

Today the Asia-Pacific region stands on the verge of major change, with centuries of western dominated regional order being seriously challenged and quite possibly nearing its end. The emergence of a potential new order dominated by regional rather than extra-regional powers - an «Asia for the Asiatics» in the words of Japan’s pan-Asian scholars - means it is now more than ever essential to understand the history of the current western-dominated system, the full implications should it cont...

East Asia has been a growing focal point of geopolitical conflict since the 1940s, and today increasingly sits at the heart of the global economy and high tech as rising regional powers challenge the centuries-old primacy of the Western world. With half a millennium of Western dominated order in the region facing unprecedented challenges and possibly nearing its end, it is now more than ever essential to understand the history behind it and its objectives. This book undertakes the task of ...