January 16, 2007  “Our global enemies are channeling resources into the current conflict, while our own allies are slipping away. Our military equipment is wearing down, and we lack the resources to fix it. Critics at home and abroad dispute our claims to moral leadership. It is time to choose: Either recall our forces or else send substantial reinforcements, commit major financial resources, and appoint a new commander.” This is the story of US military strategy in early 2007 AD – or is it the tale of Athens circa 413 BC?

Keith Brown, acting director of the Watson Institute’s Policy, Culture, and Identity Program, draws parallels between Ancient Athens’ failed expedition into Sicily and current US plans for Iraq in an opinion piece published this week by the International Relations and Security Network.

Also commenting recently on the Bush Administration’s Iraq policy was Watson Distinguished Visiting Fellow Lincoln Chafee '75. Interviewed on local NBC 10 prior to Bush's Iraq speech last week, former US Sen. Chafee emphasized the importance of the Iraq Study Group Report released in December – underscoring its recommendations on an external approach to peace that would involve Iraq’s neighbors. On air, Chafee expressed his view that the report merited significant attention by the President, since it was commissioned by Congress and conducted by a bi-partisan group of highly respected individuals. He repeated the report’s opening sentences on air: “The situation in Iraq is grave and deteriorating. There is no path that can guarantee success, but the prospects can be improved.”

Reflecting on Bush's speech afterward at the Institute, Chafee noted that: “To me, what the President seems to be ignoring is the recommendation that we have a better relationship with Iraq’s neighbors. He didn’t mention one word in his speech about a better relationship with the Iranians and the Syrians, in particular, but also Iraq’s other neighbors – the Turks, the Saudis, the Jordanians, and the Kuwaitis.”

On a more personal note, Chafee added that “I can’t help but deplore the daily horrors coming from what we grew up studying as the cradle of civilization, the Valley of the Tigris and Euphrates, where human beings first learned the rule of law and an alphabet.”

Also on the day of the President's speech, the Providence Journal ran an interview with Global Security Program Director James Der Derian. “He has basically fired the generals who don’t agree with him,” Der Derian said of Bush. “This is urban warfare; it is the worst kind of warfare to fight.” 

Read the op-ed here.
Read the Providence Journal article here.
Read the Iraq Study Group Report here.