Iraq

The inability of the Syrian government to crush an 18-month-old revolutionary movement is putting increasing pressure on its neighbors. Not only have hundreds of thousands of refugees from Syria poured into Jordan, Turkey, Lebanon and Iraq, but political forces in each of those countries are having to choose sides and to reevaluate their choices over […]

Iraq

10,000 Syrian Refugees Trapped on Iraq & Turkish Borders

Juan Cole

Human Rights Watch is calling on Iraq and Turkey to open their borders in Syria’s northeast to allow the passage of some 10,000 Syrian refugees, caught in the desert without proper sanitation. Aljazeera English reports on the closed Iraqi border at Qa’im. The Shiite-dominated Iraqi government fears that some of the Syrians seeking to escape […]

Afghanistan

Romney’s Five Wars

Juan Cole

Mitt Romney’s speech at VMI on foreign policy has been widely condemned as vague and lacking in substance, sort of like the man who gave it. But the speech is also full of suggestions and criticisms of the Obama administration that are simply not realistic. The speech is Romney’s “Mission Impossible,” only without the cool […]

Afghanistan

Top Seven Errors President Obama has made on the Middle East

Juan Cole

Yesterday I explored the errors and fantasies in Gov. Mitt Romney’s WSJ op-ed on the Middle East. Here I will briefly go over the mistakes that the Obama administration has made in the region. Unlike the proposed blunders of Romney, I have to say, most of these are errors of omission or of an abundance […]

Afghanistan

Tom Ricks and The Generals: Why the US succeeded in WWII but not Since

Juan Cole

Tom Ricks, award-winning military journalist, gives the Nimitz Lecture on why the US military succeeded in WW II but had so much trouble in the Korean, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan wars. The book version is out shortly, Tom Ricks, The Generals: American Military Command from World War II to Today See also Ricks’s invaluable blog

Iraq War

Netanyahu 2002: Iraq has Centrifuges ‘the size of Washing Machines’ to Produce A-Bomb

Juan Cole

Israeli PM Binyamin “Chicken Little” Netanyahu tried to scaremonger about Iraq in 2002, as his contribution to the Anglo-American war of aggression on that country. “there is no question whatsoever,” Netanyahu said, “that Saddam” was seeking nuclear weapons. He said that Israeli intelligence reported to him that Russian scientists and North Korea were on site […]

Iraq

A Tale of Two Insurrections: Syria, Iraq, and American Security

Juan Cole

Both Iraq and Syria saw massive violence on Sunday. But there is a key difference between the two, and therein lies a cautionary tale for Syria. In Iraq, guerrillas of the so-called “Islamic State of Iraq,” an al-Qaeda affiliate, set off car bombs in almost every single important town and city in the country, leaving […]

Iraq

Tutu Slams Tony Blair for Illegal Iraq War, boycotts Leadership Conference

Juan Cole

South African Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu made waves by refusing to attend the recent Discovery Invest Leadership Summit in Johannesburg because of the presence of former British prime minister Tony Blair. His reasoning? Blair is a war criminal because of his support for and participation in the 2003 George W. Bush invasion and occupation of […]

Iraq

Just Deserts: Iraqis get Iraq’s Oil, not Bush/Cheney (Muttitt)

Juan Cole

Gregg Muttitt writes at Tomdispatch: Mission Accomplished for Big Oil? How an American Disaster Paved the Way for Big Oil’s Rise — and Possible Fall — in Iraq By Greg Muttitt In 2011, after nearly nine years of war and occupation, U.S. troops finally left Iraq. In their place, Big Oil is now present in […]