Michael Totten is Coming!
He'll be joining us next Friday to discuss his book, In the Wake of the Surge. If you haven't yet read it, you still have time, and it's genuinely worth that time.
Here's part of the Daily Caller's interview with him:
Had American forces not invaded Iraq and deposed Saddam Hussein, what would Saddam Hussein’s Iraq look like today? What problems would it pose to America’s Middle East strategy?
Saddam Hussein’s Iraq would remain the totalitarian prison state that it always was, only the international sanctions against him would almost certainly have elapsed. The whole sanctions regime was coming apart before the invasion.
And can you imagine how dangerous the Middle East would be if we were worried about two Persian Gulf nations acquiring nuclear weapons instead of only Iran? I don’t doubt for a minute that the Middle East is a better place now because Saddam is out of power. Whether it was worth the high cost is debatable.
Are you optimistic about Iraq’s future?
On even numbered days, yes. On odd numbered days, no. I was a witness when General David Petraeus defeated Al Qaida and the Shia militias, and I dramatize that in my book. The country is mind-bogglingly dysfunctional, though, and I think I show that pretty thoroughly, too. One of the most pessimistic things I ever heard in that country was said by an American corporal who was standing outside FOB War Eagle in Baghdad where he had spent the better part of a year. “Iraq,” he said between drags on his cigarette, “will always be Iraq.”
Some people argue that democracy in Iraq was a major influence on the Arab Spring. From your reporting in Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East, do you buy that argument?
No — sorry, I don’t.
Never once have I heard an Arab anywhere in the Middle East say they felt inspired by anything that happened in Iraq. Most think the war was unjust. I think they’re wrong about that even when I’m inclined to think the war might have been a mistake. What really freaked them out, though, was how the place came apart after the tyrant was gone. Arabs fear each other more than you might think if you pay attention to all the happy talk about the pan-Arab nation. Arab Nationalism is a popular idea in part because it promises a yearned-for unity that does not exist and never has.
The two freest Arab countries, Iraq and Lebanon, are the two that have suffered the worst Arab-on-Arab violence in the modern era. Sectarianism, not freedom, should be blamed for the communal slaughter in both places, and everyone knows it, but the civil wars in each place nevertheless scared the daylights out of people all over the region. They looked at Iraq and shuddered at the charnel house it became.
Nobody felt inspired. Nobody.
Let's save the discussion of this for Friday, when he'll be around to answer questions.
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Comments :
May '10
Re: Michael Totten is Coming!
Oh phew! I thought I'd missed it - it took me longer to read the book than I'd hoped, and I was sure you'd all had the discussion long ago.
Splendid!
Oct '10
Re: Michael Totten is Coming!
Good catch, Claire! This will be great.
Edited on Dec 11, 2011 at 4:51amApr '11
Re: Michael Totten is Coming!
If this book is only 25% as good as Totten's "The Road to Fatima Gate," it will still be an essential read.