Question of the Day

Reviewing Walt and Mearsheimer’s book, Lee Smith asks:

But here is one sticking point among many that Walt and Mearsheimer cannot account for: If realism holds that states act rationally in pursuit of their own interests, then how did Washington get away with acting irrationally for forty years? Either Washington has not acted irrationally, or Walt and Mearsheimer’s realist model is irrational, or both.