Broadside: No More Iraqs?

MIT political scientist Barry Posen argues for future limits on US troop involvement overseas

A defense analyst joined NECN to argue for future limits on U.S. troop involvement overseas.

MIT political scientist Barry Posen is the author of "Restraint: A New Foundation for U.S. Grand Strategy."

In wake of the Sunni terror group ISIS conquering much of Iraq and Syria, Posen made the case that the U.S. should not be involved. He also discussed the opinion of the American people.

“I think the American people often have been ambivalent. The concern of the National Security League right now, I think the reason you get these excited tones, is because the American people are showing that they’re not that ambivalent,” Posen said. “They’re pretty disinterested in large scale warfare and I think part of the problem is the Americans have been at this so-called Global War on Terror since the tragedy of 9/11 and they’ve been told every few years about various kinds of progress that’s being made.”

Posen continued by explaining his belief that Americans have grown more cautious about being involved in Iraq after years of believing a difference was being made there.

“Because things cascaded so quickly in the direction of ISIS over the last few weeks, they’re afraid there could be another set of catastrophic losses,” Posen explained. “My inclination here would be to assume that the Shiites are strong enough to hold Baghdad on their own and we should have kind of stood back and sort of said ‘in the event of really, really extreme events, maybe we can bring in some capacity.’”

Posen concluded with thoughts about the politics in U.S. and if anyone in office has alternative plans other than fighting in Iraq.

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