This reader contains a sample of the essays published in the US foreign policy quarterly, The National Interest , during its first four years. The period covered by this volume was a critical one for American foreign policy. It represented a recovery of confidence after the uncertainty and self-laceration of the 1960s and 1970s. But it was also a period when dramatic events in the communist world raised fundamental questions about the ending of the Cold War and about prevailing American foreign policy. The essays in this volume examine the basic and enduring questions of international politics and the national security of the United States. These and related issues are discussed in the reader by leading American policymakers, academics and commentators.