Nuclear Issues

After a tumultuous week of unpredictable twists and turns during President Donald Trump’s visit to Europe, anxiety levels have risen among experts and policy makers about the coming summit between Trump and President Vladimir Putin. As President Trump himself has noted, there is no shortage of issues demanding the attention of the two leaders: Syria, Iran, arms control and — who knows — maybe even Russia’s interference in America’s elections. But energy could snake its way onto the agenda, and Trump needs to be careful not to give Putin concessions in exchange for something the Russian president already plans on doing.

Putin and his government seek respect, stability from next U.S. administration, panel says.

The Summer 2013 issue of the Belfer Center newsletter features recent and upcoming activities, research, and analysis by members of the Center community on critical global issues. This edition highlights the Belfer Center’s expanding work on complex cybersecurity issues and Middle East challenges, offers reflections on the role of the U.S. in Iraq, and spotlights work being done by the Center and its affiliates on environment and energy issues.

"George W. Bush's presidency really was that bad — and the fact that Obama has largely followed the same course is less a measure of Bush's wisdom than a reminder of the depth of the hole he dug his country into, as well as the institutionalized groupthink that dominates the U.S. foreign-policy establishment."

BEIRUT -- This week’s sixth anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attack on the United States sees the top American military and diplomatic officials in Iraq speaking to the US Congress about American strategy in Iraq. The juxtaposition is noteworthy: Six years ago, a small band of Al-Qaeda militants attacked the United States and killed some 3000 people. Today, an army of over 160,000 American troops wages a war in Iraq that has seen tens of thousands of people killed since 2003. Neither policy makes much sense to anyone in the world, other than to those fanatics on both sides who decided to pursue these actions.

This article was prepared for a Council on Foreign Relations/International Institute for Strategic Studies Symposium on Iraq's Impact on the Future of US Foreign and Defence Policy, with generous support from Rita E. Hauser.

"...the Bush administration's foreign policy rests on a deep misreading of contemporary world politics. Conducting foreign policy on the basis of flawed premises is like designing an airplane while ignoring gravity...."

Nearly five years after the terrorist attacks of September 11, has the government adequately protected its citizens against terrorism and catastrophic disaster?

Making the case for action against Iraq, President Bush has quoted what President John F. Kennedy said in October of 1962: "We no longer live in a world where only the actual firing of weapons represents a sufficient challenge to a nation's security to constitute maximum peril."

In thinking about Iraq, one of the president's closest advisers told The New York Times,"The example he refers to is the Cuban missile crisis." Says Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld: "It is not a perfect, on all fours, analogy, but it is certainly as similar as anything in recent years that one can find."

As a longtime student of the missile crisis, I agree with Mr. Bush that the similarities between it and the current face-off with Iraq are more salient than the differences. What's uncertain in the current crisis, however, is whether Bush will grasp and apply what Kennedy judged the most significant lesson of the missile crisis.

As preparation for war against Iraq intensifies, the time has come to pause and consider the view from Baghdad. Conclusions from such an exercise are not comforting. But to strike without thinking seriously about what Saddam Hussein could do to us would be irresponsible.