While Iraq-related debates continue to dominate the headlines, Morton Abramowitz, in the Spring 2004 issue of The National Interest, was the first senior member of the foreign policy establishment to attempt to furnish a veneer of intellectual respectability for the proposition that a precipitous American withdrawal from Iraq would not necessarily be calamitous. (He has been followed more recently by William Odom, former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, who is a contributor to this symposium as well.) Accordingly, these views merit attention, even if they are, in my opinion, ultimately unpersuasive.
Abramowitz analyzes both the probability and the consequences of our success in Iraq--success being defined as the establishment of "a stable, reasonably democratic system"--as well as the implications of an early departure, both on the country itself and the Greater Middle East. Although there is some analytical overlap between these two issues, they are not identical. Indeed, while the prospects and strategic implications of building a U.S.-prompted Iraqi democracy are probably better than Abramowitz seems to suggest, it is fair to acknowledge that they are inherently speculative and uncertain.
