By Christopher Hill DENVER: Angelina Jolie’s new film, “In the Land of Blood and Honey,” is about the ethnic tensions that produced the bloodiest conflict in Europe since World War II. The film has already won two awards and is an emerging box-office success, attesting to the enduring interest — and perhaps mystery — that the …

By Christopher Hill DENVER: Yemen’s renewed violence is just the latest sign that the Arab Spring may be joining the list of those historical contagions that, in the fullness of time, did not turn out well. Indeed, its effect may be reaching countries in ways that we did not expect. Israel, in particular, can be forgiven …

By Christopher Hill DENVER: Patience might be a virtue, but not necessarily when it comes to American foreign policy. Consider “the long war,” a bold concept embraced a few years ago to describe the continuing struggle against terrorism, the grudging progress that could realistically be achieved, and the enormous financial burden that it would impose for …

By Christopher Hill DENVER: US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates’ recent prognosis of a “dim” and “dismal” future for NATO has triggered much debate, but it could well prove optimistic. June, it turns out, marks another milestone on the alliance’s uncertain path: its operation in Libya has now surpassed in length the one in Kosovo 12 …

By Christopher Hill DENVER: Not since 1989 has the world seen such an all-consuming, all-engulfing wildfire of freedom and democracy, whose burning passions are sweeping across a region vast and old and desperately in need of reform. From the Maghreb to the Levant to the Arabian Peninsula, Arab history is on the move. A new generation …

By Christopher Hill DENVER: Meet any Korean of a certain age, and you will learn about barley season, which begins in February and stretches through the cold months of early spring until the first of the winter barley crop is harvested. Few South Koreans remember those straitened months anymore, but for North Koreans, hunger in the …