To begin a two-day conference on the war in Iraq, former Congressman Lee Hamilton (D-Ind.) predicted yesterday that, at best, a "tolerable outcome" would result from the war in Iraq.
Hamilton, the president and director of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and the U.S. congressman from Indiana's ninth congressional district for 34 years, outlined the major challenges that the United States will face as the country tries to leave Iraq "responsibly."
In opening the conference, entitled "The United States and the Middle East: What Comes Next After Iraq?" Hamilton presented his keynote address to an overflowing crowd in Cabot Auditorium.
"The fact of the matter is, we've had a failure of political leadership," Hamilton said, criticizing the inter-partisan conflicts that have dominated decisions on the war. "American foreign policy is always better, always stronger, if we're unified."
He discussed how Americans see Iraq in the headlines, pointing out that it is now the second-most expensive war the United States has ever fought.
Hamilton spent the majority of his speech addressing the United States' foreign policy regarding Iraq, something the next president will have to deal with. Hamilton indicated that the question of how the new administration should deal with the war in Iraq will be one of the major focuses of the two-day conference.
"I think the good options in Iraq are long since past ... I think tolerable outcomes are still achievable," he said.
Hamilton said policy makers have refused to see that while the military has improved security in Iraq in the last year, there is no way the problem in Iraq will be solved by military means alone.
"We view the conflict there as one to be resolved by the American military," he said, adding that that notion was particularly frustrating for him.
He stressed that if the American government pools all its resources, it may be able to achieve a tolerable stability in Iraq, but said that this surely will be far from the "victory" Americans predicted at the beginning of the war.
Regardless of the stance the new president takes, Hamilton said he "suspect[s] you and I are not going to like the way [the war] turns out."
Since the next president will face what Hamilton said could be one of the most complicated foreign policy situations he has seen in his entire lifetime, that the new commander-in-chief will need to address not just Iraq, but the entire region around it.
"The new president is not going to be able to look at the world through the prism of Iraq," he said.
This two-day conference will include over 30 lecturers and panelists before its conclusion this evening. It is sponsored by the Fares Center for Eastern Mediterranean Studies.
The conference is divided into five different sessions, each of which will concentrate on a particular topic and will include a moderator and four panelists who are experts in the area. The session held yesterday after the keynote address was titled "The Gulf."
The remaining sessions will take place today, from 8:45 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. They are titled "The Arab-Israeli Conflict," "Democracy and Reform," "Islamic Parties and Groups" and "Challenges Facing U.S. Policy and Public Diplomacy."
There will also be a Webcast keynote address by General Anthony Zinni from 1:15 to 2:15 p.m., and concluding remarks by Rashid Khalidi, Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies at Columbia University.
Most guests have pre-registered for the event, but it is still possible to register to attend tomorrow before the last four sessions begin.
