Autor: Robert Kagan

Reports on the Bush administration's efforts to craft a new strategy in Iraq often use the term 'surge' but rarely define it. Estimates of the number of troops to be added in Baghdad range from fewer than 10,000 to more than 30,000. Some 'surges' would last a few months, others a few years.

To say that this is not a new idea is an understatement. Donald Rumsfeld and top military officials have from the beginning of the occupation three years ago aimed to do precisely what the Baker-Hamilton group now recommends. In 2003, the Pentagon set a goal of reducing the forces from 130,000 to 30,000 by the end of the year, handing responsibility for Iraq to the newly formed Iraqi army.

El realismo en política exterior está en auge estos días, nos dicen. De ser cierto, sería alentador, porque nuestra política exterior tiene por fuerza que ser realista. Pero lo que hoy se presenta como «realismo» tiene muy poco que ver con la realidad.

El presidente tiene dos años para dar un vuelco a las cosas y dejar al próximo presidente un Irak viable. Debería ser obvio que 'mantener el curso' es la receta del fracaso. Lo mismo que las estrategias de salida políticamente encaminadas. Al presidente le queda la elección: abandonar, o hacer lo que sea necesario para tener éxito.

But the question is whether the benefits outweigh the costs. I will leave to others the matter of whether this deal will really encourage, say, Brazil or South Africa to resume nuclear weapons programs they long ago abandoned, though I'm inclined to doubt it.

The purple ink on 11 million Iraqi fingers had not yet dried after an unprecedented, almost miraculous exercise in democratic freedom--and already there were querulous American critics working hard to make light of the whole thing.

El presente debate acerca de retirar tropas americanas de Irak sería divertido si no fuera tan peligrosamente ajeno a la realidad.

Rep. Jack Murtha has had a distinguished congressional career. But his outburst last Thursday was breathtakingly irresponsible.

New security structures are needed in East Asia, but they should involve America's democratic allies, all of whom now share an increasing fear of a China whose rise may or may not be entirely peaceful.

We do not know how close the American effort in Iraq may be to irrecoverable failure.