Defending Honor, Distrusting Charity

Two news items in the last few days have a deep psychological connection. The first tells of a Dutch force in Afghanistan in one of its most dangerous provinces that is trying to win the struggle with the Taliban by concentrating almost entirely on reconstruction projects. They are armed men, but their strategy is to use arms [...]

American Strategy in Iraq

Juan Cole reprints in his blog the opinion of Professor Kahl of Minnesota on the apparent counterinsurgency strategies of the United States since the beginning of the Iraq war. Let me summarize briefly Professor Kahl’s points. He divides the COIN operations into four phases.
Phase 1: Denial. Until April 2004, there was a general denial [...]

Iraqi Opinions

Juan Cole leads us to consider some recent polls. A recent survey by the British Opinion Research Business (ORB) showed that Iraqis had remarkable confidence in spite of all that has happened. Support for Prime Minister Maliki was much more widespread than had been expected. In their polls, increase in support compared with September was [...]

Iran in Iraq

In the last few days the Times has given us a summary of the recent economic penetration by Iran into Iraq. We could view this negatively, as many in Washington are wont to do. But from the viewpoint of all but the hardest line Sunnis, it should be considered as a real harbinger of hope [...]

Thoughts on Resolving the Democrat’s Dilemma

Unfortunately, the only good strategy most democrats have for getting out of Iraq is a rewriting of the argument that we shouldn’t have gotten in, and when we got in, we should have done x, y, and z. This is all true, but as David Brooks point out in today’s Op-Ed, it doesn’t add up [...]

British Withdrawals

The announcement that the British intended to evacuate nearly half of their forces cast a gloomy shadow over American plans. Commentators noted that several of the other coalition partners had plans to reduce their forces or leave completely in the near future. These were mostly small symbolic forces, but symbols are important.
Juan Cole tells us [...]

“The Surge”: Another View

Congress is intent on showing up the foolishness of the administration, as exemplified by the sending of more troops to Iraq. Many of my comments have suggested the reasons why the surge is a foolish gamble.
Yet recent reports suggest that there is a chance that I may once again be wrong. There seem to [...]

Disengagement

In a New York Times Op-Ed yesterday, Edward Luttwak describes an exit strategy from Iraq that makes more sense than most. (Luttwak is a very well known military analyst, generally expressing a conservative slant.) He suggests that as soon as the Bush people get over their current infatuation with the surge, they can blame failure [...]

We Must Negotiate with Iran

In a recent New York Times Op-Ed (January 30), Viorst makes a case for involving the Arab League in efforts to end the war in Iraq. Unfortunately, he contrasts this suggestion with that of the Iraq Study Group that emphasizes negotiation with Syria and Iran, “the very countries”, he asserts, “that have an interest in Iraq’s [...]

Escape from Iraq Through Iran

Many in Washington believe that the alternatives to a disastrous retreat from Iraq are few. One of the alternatives that some feel administration people are entertaining is a widening of the war to Iran. American statements in regard to Iran have been threatening since the “Axis of Evil” speech. Iran was never given credit for [...]