After the Cold War by a Domestic Realist Perspective

The main idea of this article is to suggest US to focus back on itЎ¦s domestic issues, rather than over-spending money and effort in Iraq. After 9/11, US attempted to build a local government in Iraq. However, it failed. Friedman suggested that it is nearly impossible for US to shape Iraq in their own vision. US canЎ¦t simply Ў§baby-sitЎЁ Iraq by sending more troops, for an infinite time. US has to What US have paid for Iraq, is far beyond what it can endure, and what it could have achieved in itЎ¦s own country. Therefore, the only way to deal with the situation is to either get allies to sustain the job in Iraq together, or to retreat all the troops and let Iraq to find the Ў§equilibriumЎЁ by itself.

This article may not have a direct linkage to what we have covered in lectures. From textbook and lectures, we often focus on Ў§What happenedЎЁ, Ў§why it happenedЎЁ and Ў§how it happenedЎЁ but we barely covered the topic Ў§what should we do nextЎЁ. Here this article provides us with the authorЎ¦s idea of Ў§what we should do nextЎЁ by linking these opinions to what we have learned: Ў§Why it happenedЎЁ. As US garrisoning Iraq is a result from The War On Terror(as we have already covered in lecture as well as the documentary of Ў§The Power of NightmareЎЁ), this article gives us a good example of how much America has sacrificed from the war of terror, and what it should do next. Therefore, IЎ¦ve chosen this article to provide us with alternative to deal with IraqЎ¦s ambiguous situation, rather than telling us more about the history.

Although not entirely legitimate, the article demonstrates a slight sense of liberal perspective. Friedman suggests that to deal with the current situation, US should either Ў§get help or get outЎЁ. US needs to have allies to sustain what they have been contributing to Iraq with them; because US canЎ¦t simply do everything by themselves. By this Ў§get helpЎЁ argument, we can tell that Friedman echoes with liberal perspectiveЎ¦s idea and emphasis of cooperating with each other as well as relationships. However, on the other hand, the suggested Ў§get outЎЁ solution has demonstrated a mixture of realist and identity perspective. Friedman stated that Ў§WeЎ¦ve never had sufficient