Iraq
April 10, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
The late Christopher Hitchens had a standard response to Iraq war critics who ridiculed Vice President Cheney and others who predicted that U.S. troops would be greeted as liberators in Iraq. His response: “They were, I saw it.” Others saw the same thing, and reported it. Michael Rubin collects some of these reports. For example, there was this from the Daily Record of April 10, 2003: Ten days ago, when
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April 9, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
Nouri al-Maliki, the Prime Minister of Iraq, writes an op-ed for the Washington Post called “A partner in Iraq.” The most significant thing about the op-ed is that Maliki took the trouble to produce it. By doing so, he goes a ways towards demonstrating that the U.S. does have a partner, of sorts, in Iraq and that, as he puts it, the U.S. has not lost Iraq. Maliki’s piece relies
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April 1, 2013 — Scott Johnson
When USMC General John Allen’s retirement was announced in February, our friend Hugh Hewitt called on Victor Davis Hanson to answer the question whether such a drain of military talent — the retirements of Generals McChrystal, Petraeus, Mattis and Allen, in that order — had ever previously occurred in our country’s history over so short a period of time (30 months) because of retirement. “That they occurred during wartime,” Hugh
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March 26, 2013 — Scott Johnson
Along with Congress and the American people, we supported the war to depose Saddam Hussein. Ten years on, how is the war to be judged? As the saying attributed to Kierkegaard has it, life must be lived forward, but it can only be understood backward. I don’t think ten years’ time gives us enough perspective in this case, and judgment is complicated by Obama’s abandonment of the project. Among those
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March 25, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
Michael Walsh at NRO blames the Obama presidency on the Iraq War. Taking things one step further, he blames the Clinton presidency on our first war in Iraq: Like father, like son. The first President Bush squandered sky-high poll ratings into a defeat at the hands of a man the nation barely knew, Bill Clinton, in part because of the unsatisfying end to the first Gulf War, which ended with
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March 25, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
Scott isn’t the only observer who has noticed the Obama administration’s neglect of Iraq and the significant adverse consequences that flow from that neglect. Consider these words by the Washington Post editorial board: [In Iraq] violence continues, the central government appears to be crumbling, and the United States, by failing to live up to its promises of partnership, is tipping the country toward deeper trouble. . . . Iran’s influence
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March 25, 2013 — Scott Johnson
Secretary of State (remember?) John Kerry took a detour to Baghdad on his current trip to the Middle East. He sought to persuade the government of Prime Minister Maliki to stop Iran from flying arms across Iraqi territory to support the Assad regime. The United States has more or less abandoned Iraq, Iraq lacks an air force, and Iran is filling the vacuum created by our withdrawal. The New York
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March 23, 2013 — Steven Hayward
Peggy Noonan poses the question today, “Can the Republican Party Recover from Iraq?” If the article is behind the paywall, here’s a relevant sample: Did the Iraq war hurt the GOP? Yes. The war, and the crash of ’08, half killed it. It’s still digging out, and whether it can succeed is an open question. . . It ruined the party’s hard-earned reputation for foreign-affairs probity. They started a war
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March 20, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
I’d like to make a final point in my exchange with Rajiv Chandrasekaran about the success (or not) of the Iraq troop surge. My initial post is here. Rajiv’s response and my reply are here. Rajiv and I agree that important political goals of the surge have not been achieved. But it may be worthwhile to consider why they weren’t. Here is Max Boot’s take: The “surge” of 2007-2008 reduced
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March 20, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
Max Boot provides an appraisal of the Iraq War, which the U.S. initiated ten years ago. His appraisal is sound; indeed, I agree with virtually every word. One thing that’s missing from Boot’s account, and from all others I’ve seen, is a consideration of what would have happened had the U.S. not gone to war. Avoiding this discussion is understandable given the speculative nature of “counter-factual” analysis. But one can’t
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March 19, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
Yesterday, I disagreed with Rajiv Chandrasekaran’s claim that it’s a “myth” that “the troop surge succeeded” in Iraq. Rajiv has done me the favor of commenting, on Power Line, about my post. I thank him for doing so. Here is Rajiv’s comment: Paul, the surge also had *political* goals. “The Government of Iraq commits to: Reform its cabinet to provide even-handed service delivery. Act on promised reconciliation initiatives (oil law,
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March 18, 2013 — Scott Johnson
Arkansas Fourth District Rep. Tom Cotton appeared on CNN’s State of the Nation yesterday along with his colleague Hawaii Second District Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (video below). Our friend Rep. Cotton set forth a few significant truths about the American effort in Iraq that should not be obscured by Rajiv Chandrasekaran and his media colleagues. In the Wall Street Journal over the weekend, Naval War College professor of national security affairs
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March 18, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
Rajiv Chandrasekaran is a Washington Post reporter who has written extensively, and inaccurately, about U.S. involvement in Iraq. Years ago, I criticized his reporting here, here, here, and here. Now, for the tenth anniversary of our invasion of Iraq, Chandrasekaran is back with what he claims are “five myths about Iraq.” His analysis is as distorted as ever. Parts of Chandrasekaran’s piece are just silly. For example, he cites as
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February 27, 2013 — Scott Johnson
The Claremont Institute continues its American Mind series with host Charles Kesler, editor of the Claremont Review of Books, and guest Mark Helprin. Helprin is the acclaimed novelist and observer of the contemporary scene. He has been a ferocious critic of our response to 9/11 in Afghanistan and Iraq. The institute posts the interview in segments on a weekly basis here. We are pleased to post the interview in its
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January 6, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
Yesterday, I wrote that the “Arab Spring” is coming to Iraq. Perhaps I should have said that it has already arrived. As Reuters reports: Over the past two weeks, tens of thousands of Sunnis have staged demonstrations, and in Anbar province they have blocked a highway to Syria in a show of anger against Maliki, whom they accuse of marginalizing their community and monopolizing power. The discontent is real, but
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January 5, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
Does the turbulence in the Middle East contain a unifying theme, and if so what is it? A year and a half ago, many would have identified the quest for democracy as the commonality. Today, not so much. For me, the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood ties together events in several Middle Eastern countries, most notably Egypt and Syria. But it has no direct relevance to Iran, a vital player
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December 3, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
The Washington Post reports on the reemergence of al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI). According to Bruce Reidel, a former CIA counterterrorism expert now with the Brookings Institution, “what we’re now seeing is al Qaeda in Iraq’s revival, not only as a movement in that country but as a regional movement.” Reidel notes that from its base in the Sunni provinces west of Baghdad, AQI is building networks in Syria and
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