Successor to Today in Iraq
The present-day U.S. military qualifies by any measure as highly professional, much more so than its Cold War predecessor. Yet the purpose of today’s professionals is not to preserve peace but to fight unending wars in distant places. Intoxicated by a post-Cold War belief in its own omnipotence, the United States allowed itself to be drawn into a long series of armed conflicts, almost all of them yielding unintended consequences and imposing greater than anticipated costs. Since the end of the Cold War, U.S. forces have destroyed many targets and killed many people. Only rarely, however, have they succeeded in accomplishing their assigned political purposes. . . . [F]rom our present vantage point, it becomes apparent that the “Revolution of ‘89” did not initiate a new era of history. At most, the events of that year fostered various unhelpful illusions that impeded our capacity to recognize and respond to the forces of change that actually matter.
In an unannounced visit to Baghdad, U.S. Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter says U.S. will deploy 560 additional troops to Iraq to support the offensive against Mosul. It appears at least some of them will be at the recently recaptured Qayyarah airbase, which will be the staging area for the assault.
Reports that IS forces are abandoning Hawija, a city in Kirkuk province.
Posted by
Cervantes
at
11:40 AM
0 comments:
Post a Comment