Profile avatar
will-smiley.bsky.social
History (Ottoman and Russian Empires) and international law. Author, "From Slaves to Prisoners of War" (Oxford, 2018) and co-author, "To Save the Country" (Yale, 2019). All views strictly my own.
88 posts 130 followers 135 following
Regular Contributor
Active Commenter
Posts 23 Comments 27

Thermostatic foreign policy? Reactionary centrists counterbalancing against whomever is in power?

submitted 5 hours ago • 1 comment

Najwan Darwish, “An Ottoman Tune.” No One Will Know You Tomorrow: Selected Poems, 2014-2024 (Yale University Press, 2024).

submitted 8 hours ago • 0 comments

I reviewed Leyla Amzi-Erdoğdular's wonderful book "The Afterlife of Ottoman Europe: Muslims in Habsburg Bosnia Herzegovina" for JOTSA. Link and text below for those interested. www.academia.edu/127813727/Re...

submitted 15 hours ago • 0 comments

I think there's a case this "deal" is illegal, and US lawmakers should say that they'll never enforce it: "A treaty is void if...procured by the threat or use of force in violation of the principles of international law embodied in the [UN] Charter" (VCLT, Art. 52) www.nytimes.com/2025/02/22/w...

submitted 16 hours ago • 0 comments

I’d like to think I’m the first person to get into a flame war with VPOTUS from the swimming pool of Woburn Center Parcs at half-term.

submitted 1 day ago • 139 comments

If the new legislation passes, my colleagues in Israel and I could potentially be exposed to prison sentences not only for activism, but also potentially for run of the mill research in international law.

submitted 1 day ago • 0 comments

You cannot recover from this with future investments The data uncollected are lost forever

submitted 2 days ago • 8 comments

Over on LinkedIn, the head of the Executive Secretariat of the NIH -- a central part of NIH leadership 🧪🩺-- resigned with a lettter worth reading www.linkedin.com/posts/nathan...

submitted 2 days ago • 45 comments

Great letter from my colleagues @sbagen.bsky.social, @mjschlanger.bsky.social and other legal scholars across the country explaining why it is not necessary to start eliminating university programs because Trump

submitted 2 days ago • 6 comments

"For generations, the U.S. academy has been a pillar of soft power and economic dynamism. That is being thrown away now—not on the scale of years but of months, even weeks. The damage being done is not yet irreparable but that point is rapidly (*rapidly*) approaching."

submitted 2 days ago • 1 comment

Zelensky was elected with a majority of Ukrainian votes. His presidency was extended per the Constitution during the war. It’s odd to hear him called a dictator by someone who led a failed coup and is now expanding the executive branch in violation of American norms and processes

submitted 3 days ago • 155 comments

NEW -- In the span of one month we may just witnessed a generational blow to science in America. The DOGE-induced brain drain has very much begun my latest at The Bulwark www.thebulwark.com/p/the-doge-b...

submitted 3 days ago • 68 comments

新刊　オスマン帝国のスエズ海軍：スエズ海軍工廠における造船 Osmanlı İdaresinde Süveyş Donanması: Süveyş Tersanesi'nde Gemi İnşası, 16-18. Yüzyıllar / Tahir Sevinç. İdeal Kültür Yayıncılık, 2025. 9786257059930 osmn www.kitapyurdu.com/kitap/osmanl...

submitted 4 days ago • 0 comments

Order your free covid tests before the website disappears. Covidtests.gov

submitted 4 days ago • 0 comments

The Banat of Temeşvar as an Ottoman province? Sultan Donald thinks it would be a boon to his legacy. But it would also be a boon to the Patriarch of Constantinople, who would gain a lot more Orthodox Serbs in his flocks. (this article is disgusting and morally reprehensible)

submitted 5 days ago • 0 comments

This is interesting, but whether the document is legally binding is kind of irrelevant--the commitment is supposed to be *diplomatically* binding either way. The Budapest Memorandum was carefully written so as not to be legally binding, but everyone understood it as a commitment anyway.

submitted 5 days ago • 1 comment

論文　イタリアのアルバニア反乱への干渉に対するオスマン帝国の対応 Aksoy, Volkan. 2025. “Perceptions and Policies of the Ottoman Empire on Italy’s Involvement in the Albanian Revolts (1911–1912).” Journal of Balkan and Near Eastern Studies, February, 1–22. otmn doi.org/10.1080/1944...

submitted 5 days ago • 0 comments

This guy is literally trying to access your banking information via the IRS. www.washingtonpost.com/business/202...

submitted 6 days ago • 72 comments

#USA: “Every day that passes is an emergency for millions of people for whom PEPFAR is a lifeline.” 3 weeks after the US government froze PEPFAR funding, uncertainty remains over whether this lifeline for millions of people living with HIV has been cut. www.doctorswithoutborders.ca/uncertainty-...

submitted 8 days ago • 3 comments

Some facts here—and a defense of what @christianitytoday.com is doing. I’ve had opportunity to test CT's commitment to letting reporters pursue the truth even when it was clear it would hurt. I can tell you this is not a place where the integrity wobbles www.christianitytoday.com/2025/02/chri...

submitted 7 days ago • 1 comment

This bill still has to go through the House and get the governor’s signature, all of which is very likely. It is deeply unpopular across the state. Please help us raise hell about it.

submitted 8 days ago • 1 comment

新刊　19世紀黒海南東地域の農業・商業・海運の変化：生産・エコロジー・制度 Agrarian, Commercial, and Maritime Change in the Southeastern Black Sea Region: Production, Ecology, and Institutions (1830s–1910s) / Ekin Mahmuzlu. Brill, 2025. 978-90-04-71458-8 otmn brill.com/display/titl...

submitted 8 days ago • 0 comments

This is highly revealing about the inward-looking nature of Moyn's supposed "anti-imperialism", which is really just an "America First"-ism of the Left

submitted 8 days ago • 4 comments