The Fall: Consequences of US Withdrawal From Iraq

There is no big anti‐war movement in the United States against Iraq like there was against Vietnam. But the people have finally spoken against President Bush's Iraq policy by resoundingly returning a Democratic majority to Congress. Henry Kissinger, eminence gris of American diplomacy, ponders whether this means a “return to realism.” The military historian Martin van Creveld looks at what American withdrawal would mean.     

The Strategic Hub Concept: Plan C for Iraq?

This article will apply what shall be termed a “strategic hub” concept of counterinsurgency to the war in Iraq. This concept posits that the development of insurgent and militia nodes or “hubs” of activity could provide a more relevant way to address the key dilemmas of the Iraq equation in light of the Coalition and Iraq government's inability to secure Iraq. The article will argue that ceding the insurgency and militias ground on a temporary basis may be required to maintain both military and political momentum in the post “surge” Iraq given the draw down of U.S. forces, the immaturity of the Iraqi Security Forces, and the present state of American and Iraqi politics.     

The Rise of Dark Americana: Depicting the “War on Terror” On-Screen

In the wake of the 9/11 attacks the American film industry took a while to react to the Islamist threat at home and abroad. From 2005, however, Hollywood responded to the threat to the homeland and the War on Terror “over there” in Iraq and Afghanistan in a variety of ways. This article examines the nature of that response and whether it evinces, as critics allege, that the American film industry reflects and shapes a capitalist and imperialist agenda. More particularly, by evaluating the cinematic treatment of both the Iraq war and the problem of surveillance, rendition, and homeland security, the analysis explores what this distinctive on-screen genre tells about how the U.S. cultural mainstream has dealt with the challenge global jihadism poses to American values. The analysis suggests that post-9/11 movie making, while sometimes bleak and often clichéd, is cognizant of the gray area morality inherent in fighting the “War on Terror,” and is still thus able to offer some possibilities for sophisticated reflection.     

Discourses of war,geographies of abjection: reading contemporary American ideologies of terror

This article critically details the strategies and ideologies that inform three key post-9/11 volumes on the politics of terror, war making and national security in the USA. These texts, by renowned American ‘masters of statecraft’ Robert Kaplan, Victor Davis Hanson and Michael Ledeen, encourage the USA's political and military leadership to embrace terror and violence and to be continuously at war against alleged American enemies. The article argues that these writings are representative of what French post-structuralist and gender scholar Julia Kristeva has called abjection. Indeed, these literatures require their readers to be one with hatred and destruction, and to violently reject anything that appears to be un-American. Their ideologies—which have been immensely influential in post-9/11 American national security circles—aim to prepare and condition American citizens for years of ongoing violence, war and possibly terror. They encourage hatred towards enemies that may not even have been named yet. By openly propagating these kinds of discourse, these scholars' texts render the prospect for peace (in Iraq, the Middle-East and everywhere else) in the 21st century ever more difficult to achieve.     

A First Draft of the History of America's Ongoing Wars on Terrorism

This research note attempts to map the Al Qaeda movement's trajectory from the 11 September 2001 attacks to the stunning events of 2014—which saw the continued rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), its expulsion from the Al Qaeda movement, followed by ISIS's stunning thrust into Iraq, its declaration of a caliphate, and the re-engagement of American military forces in this region. It attempts to place in context the Al Qaeda movement's evolution to explain why the United States under President Barack Obama, despite hopes and expectations to the contrary, is still enmeshed in the war on terrorism proclaimed by George W. Bush over a decade ago.     

Jihadism in Western Europe After the Invasion of Iraq: Tracing Motivational Influences from the Iraq War on Jihadist Terrorism in Western Europe

Abstract

This article investigates the importance of the invasion and occupation of Iraq as motivation for recent acts of jihadist terrorism in Western Europe. It analyses the mass casualty terrorist attack attributed to a group of Islamist militants in Madrid on 11 March 2004, and the killing of a Dutch filmmaker on the streets of Amsterdam by an Al Qaeda–inspired terrorist network. The first case has been assumed to be mainly motivated by the Iraq war, whereas the other case has been perceived as an act by an individual, motivated by domestic factors in Holland. The article situates these acts of terrorism within the theory of so-called spillover effects from armed conflicts to international terrorism. It argues that the Iraq war was a significant motivational factor for the terrorists in both cases, but that the terrorists linked the Iraq issue with perceived injustices against Muslims in Europe and globally.     

Iraq: economic sanctions and consequences, 1990–2000

It is a well known fact, of course, that Iraq has been under a UN Security Council system of comprehensive embargo for the past 10 years. The consequences of the embargo have been catastrophic for the people and the economy of Iraq. Yet our understanding of the humanitarian emergency in Iraq will be enhanced if we examine the impact not only of the embargo but of other factors as well. This paper identifies four such factors: (1) the decision by the Iraqi government to initiate the 1980-88 war against Iran; (2) the militarisation of the Iraqi economy; (3) Iraq's invasion of Kuwait and the ensuing 1991 Gulf war; and (4) the sanctions regime which has been in place since August 1990. The paper argues that, while all the non-sanctions factors played their different roles, it is, in the last analysis, the force of the intensity and the open-endedness of the sanctions regime which bears the major share of the responsibility for the current conditions in Iraq.     

Semi-Proxy Wars and U.S. Counterterrorism Strategy

On 4 February 2014, Al Qaeda leaders in Pakistan (aka Al Qaeda Central) repudiated Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq. Ayman al-Zawahiri declared that al-Baghdadi and his newly formed Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) were no longer part of Al Qaeda's organization and Al Qaeda Central could not be held responsible for ISIL's behavior. It represents the first time that Al Qaeda Central has renounced an affiliate publicly. The announcement was driven by months of fighting between ISIL and Jabhat al-Nusra, another Al Qaeda affiliate in Syria. In fact, in Syria, Al Qaeda fighters are competing against each other for influence, as well as against other opposition groups, the Syrian regime, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Iraqi militiamen, and Lebanese Hezbollah. This chaotic, semi-proxy war is unlike any previous problem encountered, made even more challenging by the limited U.S. presence on-the-ground. More worrisome, this semi-proxy war also has spread beyond Syria. Similar dynamics have emerged in Iraq, Yemen, and Lebanon to a certain extent. This article argues that these dynamics necessitate a twist in U.S. counterterrorism strategy.     

Occupational Logics and Political Commitment: American Artists Against the Iraq War

This article analyzes the political commitment of American artists, belonging to various art worlds, against the recent war in Iraq. Through the construction of three types of trajectories, I distinguish several mechanisms of commitment and forms of political involvement. I show how artists' heterogeneous professional identities structure their political commitment throughout the protest, how occupational logics shape the possible forms of action, in the artists' eyes. In the second part of the article, I focus on what is changing, in this context, in the relationships between the artistic and the political spheres, and what is revealed about their ordinary functioning. As a result of the increasing differentiation and specialization of the spheres of action in our societies, it has become more and more difficult and illegitimate for artists to fuse their artwork and their political positions. At the same time, individuals with strong resources of notoriety, especially in the film industry, have demanded a new role of public representation, challenging the exclusive political legitimacy to represent people.     

Think Local

Terrorism is the wrong term. War is the wrong metaphor. Iraq is the wrong war. That pretty much sums up how the fight against the Islamist jihadists who targeted America has gone awry in the five years since September 11, 2001 — a similar period of time in which the United States had mobilized from virtual scratch and defeated Germany and Japan in World War II.     

Old Becomes New Again: Kidnappings by Daesh and Other Salafi-Jihadists in the Twenty-First Century

Daesh fighters have taken hostage over 100 foreigners in Syria, Iraq, and elsewhere since 2012. The kidnappings drew international attention in August 2014, when American journalist James Foley was decapitated and a video of his death was posted online. But the pattern of kidnappings and gruesome videos distributed by violent Salafi-jihadists extends back over a decade to the killing of Daniel Pearl in 2002. This article traces shifts in the strategic rationale of Al Qaeda and Daesh for beheading Western hostages. It argues that terrorists altered their calculations on foreign hostages beginning in 2012 and U.S. counterterrorism policy does not take these shifts into account.     

The G‐2: Are America and China Headed for Divorce?

Thanks to the draining effects of the Iraq war and the financial meltdown emanating from Wall Street, a powershift away from American dominance is taking place. Caught between a rising China and an America in relative decline, the new leadership in Japan is recalibrating its post-World War II relationships. The G-20 has usurped the role once played by the G-8 as the governing committee of globalization. And the symbiotic coupling of "Chimerica", born out of the credit bubble built up over the past two decades, is being put to the test.
In this section, the new prime minister of Japan, the president of the European Union, the president of Brazil and a leading economic historian assess these shifts.     

The G-20 Moment

Thanks to the draining effects of the Iraq war and the financial meltdown emanating from Wall Street, a powershift away from American dominance is taking place. Caught between a rising China and an America in relative decline, the new leadership in Japan is recalibrating its post-World War II relationships. The G-20 has usurped the role once played by the G-8 as the governing committee of globalization. And the symbiotic coupling of "Chimerica", born out of the credit bubble built up over the past two decades, is being put to the test.
In this section, the new prime minister of Japan, the president of the European Union, the president of Brazil and a leading economic historian assess these shifts.     

Obama, China and Wishful Thinking About American Jobs

Thanks to the draining effects of the Iraq war and the financial meltdown emanating from Wall Street, a powershift away from American dominance is taking place. Caught between a rising China and an America in relative decline, the new leadership in Japan is recalibrating its post-World War II relationships. The G-20 has usurped the role once played by the G-8 as the governing committee of globalization. And the symbiotic coupling of "Chimerica", born out of the credit bubble built up over the past two decades, is being put to the test.
In this section, the new prime minister of Japan, the president of the European Union, the president of Brazil and a leading economic historian assess these shifts.     

Japan: Shifting Away from American-led Globalization

Thanks to the draining effects of the Iraq war and the financial meltdown emanating from Wall Street, a powershift away from American dominance is taking place. Caught between a rising China and an America in relative decline, the new leadership in Japan is recalibrating its post-World War II relationships. The G-20 has usurped the role once played by the G-8 as the governing committee of globalization. And the symbiotic coupling of "Chimerica", born out of the credit bubble built up over the past two decades, is being put to the test.
In this section, the new prime minister of Japan, the president of the European Union, the president of Brazil and a leading economic historian assess these shifts.     

Financial Markets Must Not Return to "Bad Old Ways"

Thanks to the draining effects of the Iraq war and the financial meltdown emanating from Wall Street, a powershift away from American dominance is taking place. Caught between a rising China and an America in relative decline, the new leadership in Japan is recalibrating its post-World War II relationships. The G-20 has usurped the role once played by the G-8 as the governing committee of globalization. And the symbiotic coupling of "Chimerica", born out of the credit bubble built up over the past two decades, is being put to the test.
In this section, the new prime minister of Japan, the president of the European Union, the president of Brazil and a leading economic historian assess these shifts.     

Rebalancing the Global Economy: China Must Allow Currency to Rise, US Must Boost Savings

Thanks to the draining effects of the Iraq war and the financial meltdown emanating from Wall Street, a powershift away from American dominance is taking place. Caught between a rising China and an America in relative decline, the new leadership in Japan is recalibrating its post-World War II relationships. The G-20 has usurped the role once played by the G-8 as the governing committee of globalization. And the symbiotic coupling of "Chimerica", born out of the credit bubble built up over the past two decades, is being put to the test.
In this section, the new prime minister of Japan, the president of the European Union, the president of Brazil and a leading economic historian assess these shifts.     

伊朗对伊拉克的影响力评述

伊拉克战争后,该国政治形势的巨变以及两伊在地理、历史、文化等方面的密切联系,使得伊朗对伊拉克的影响力大增。这种影响力体现在经济、文化、政治等多个方面,同时这些不同方面的影响力又相互促进。伊朗对伊拉克的影响力在伊拉克重建的不同时期大小是不同的。随着伊拉克政治形势的好转,伊拉克民众民族主义的增强,该国什叶派内部政治矛盾的加剧,两国固有的领土、民族等纷争日益显现,再加上美国等外部势力的干预,伊朗对伊拉克的影响力将受到越来越大的限制。     

Leaving Security in Safe Hands: identity,legitimacy and cohesion in the new Afghan and Iraqi armies

Built by outside powers and targeted against local insurgents, the new national armies of Afghanistan and Iraq are fragile institutions. The legitimacy of these forces is limited in the deeply divided societies in which they exist. Whereas low levels of legitimacy exert a disintegrative pressure upon an army, cohesion counterweighs such pressure. This article engages the theory of military unit cohesion for the purpose of increasing understanding of the challenges to cohesion faced by the new armies of Afghanistan and Iraq. Two main sources of legitimacy for the new armies are discussed: the (ethnic/sectarian) composition of the forces, and their respective missions. Challenges to cohesion are found to depend on how soldiers are recruited and units composed: ethnically/sectarian mixed units may disintegrate because of weak horizontal cohesion; homogeneous units (particularly when recruited as groups and not individually) may splinter off because of weak vertical cohesion. The article also argues that promoting an image of the army as ‘national’ within a society may reduce disintegrative pressures.     

Globalisation masculinities,empire building and forced prostitution: a critical analysis of the gendered impact of the neoliberal economic agenda in post-invasion/occupation Iraq

Adopting a transnational feminist lens and using a political economy approach, this article addresses both the direct and indirect consequences of the 2003 war in Iraq, specifically the impact on civilian women. Pre-war security and gender relations in Iraq will be compared with the situation post-invasion/occupation. The article examines the globalised processes of capitalism, neoliberalism and neo-colonialism and their impact on the political, social and economic infrastructure in Iraq. Particular attention will be paid to illicit and informal economies: coping, combat and criminal. The 2003 Iraq war was fought using masculinities of empire, post-colonialism and neoliberalism. Using the example of forced prostitution, the article will argue that these globalisation masculinities – specifically the privatisation agenda of the West and its illegal economic occupation – have resulted in women either being forced into the illicit (coping) economy as a means of survival, or trafficked for sexual slavery by profit-seeking criminal networks who exploit the informal economy in a post-invasion/occupation Iraq.