Explainers

Background & Context

The stories behind the headlines. Plain-English explainers on the foreign policy issues that shape the dispatches we publish every day.

The Iran Nuclear File: A Plain-English Timeline

From the Shah's American-supplied reactors to the JCPOA collapse — how one of the world's most consequential diplomatic standoffs actually developed.

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What NATO's Article 5 Actually Means — and When It Applies

The most invoked and least understood clause in modern diplomacy. What it says, what it doesn't, and what happens when it's triggered.

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The U.S.-China Rivalry: How Two Powers Ended Up Here

For thirty years, Washington bet that economic integration would moderate China's politics. It didn't. Here is how that assumption collapsed.

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