All Policy Analysis by Kenneth Pollack

To dispel confusion among America’s partners and better counter its adversaries, the administration will have to do a better job of integrating its country-specific strategies into an overarching approach for accomplishing larger goals.

American security force assistance missions to Arab states have had only limited success, in large part because they do not train local units to fight in a manner well-suited to their cultural preferences and operational requirements.

If the battle lines stay where they are now, with the capital and largest port still out of government control, then the Iranian-backed Houthis will effectively have won the war.

Four experts who recently returned from Baghdad and Erbil report on the results of the government formation process.

Retraining and reorganizing the Iraqi military and eliminating weapons of mass destruction (WMD) will be vital tasks in the wake of any U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. Yet, political change is a prerequisite for military change, and neglecting the former could pose disastrous consequences for the latter. Specifically, the United States

On July 7, 1998, Patrick Clawson, research director at The Washington Institute; Andrew Parasiliti, director of programs at the Middle East Institute; and Kenneth Pollack, research fellow at The Washington Institute addressed a Special Policy Forum marking the release of Iraq Strategy Review, an Institute study outlining the different possible

With the Clinton administration warning that its patience with Iraq is wearing thin and that military strikes could be just around the corner, it is useful to revisit the question of Iraq's current ability to respond militarily to a new round of conflict. Barely a Paper Tiger. The Iraqi armed

Saddam Husayn's speech last Saturday marking the anniversary of Operation Desert Storm confirmed that the current impasse is no ordinary Iraq crisis. Saddam gave the Security Council until May 20 to lift sanctions on Iraq or he would cease cooperation with the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM). Saddam's speech also

Saddam Husayn probably had several motives in seeking to disrupt UN weapons inspections. First, he sought to undermine the effectiveness of the UN weapons inspectors, if not expel them altogether, because they are the main obstacle to his efforts to transform Iraq into a regional power. Second, Saddam currently has

On Wednesday, Iraq announced that the American inspectors of the United Nations Special Commission on Iraq (UNSCOM) had one week to leave the country. For good measure, Baghdad demanded that UNSCOM cease using American U-2 spy planes as part of its efforts to enforce the dismantling of Iraq's weapons of

An ongoing series of shake-ups at the highest levels of the Iranian military and intelligence communities suggest that Iran's new President, Hojjat-ol Islam Mohammed Khatami, may be moving to exert control over the hardline defense establishment. In recent days he has reshuffled the leadership in the Defense Ministry, the Intelligence

Evidence continues to mount of a link between Iran and the Saudi national arrested in Canada for complicity in the bombing of the al-Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia, which killed 19 U.S. military personnel last June. Although proof is not yet conclusive, the answer to "who bombed al-Khobar" may soon

Saudi Arabia has gotten a lot of negative attention in recent months. The Saudis have been blamed for failing to pay sufficient attention to homegrown dissidents, contributing to American deaths in terrorist attacks in Riyadh and Dhahran. King Fahd's stroke in late 1995 prompted speculation that a succession crisis loomed

President Clinton's rather terse "thank you" to Hosni Mubarak following the signing of the Hebron agreement in contrast to the warm praise for Jordan's King Hussein is only the latest sign of tension in the U.S.-Egypt relationship. While this partnership has always had its share of problems, the two sides

This weekend's effort by Special Middle East Coordinator Dennis Ross to broker a conclusion to the glacial Israeli-Palestinian negotiations on Hebron replaces the mediation effort that never was -- the mission by Egyptian Foreign Minister Amre Moussa. Earlier this month, in a sign of growing anxiety over the Hebron stalemate

Two weeks ago, on the anniversary of the 1973 October War, Syrian Defense Minister Mustafa Tlas told an interviewer that it was a "Zionist fabrication" that "President al-Asad had an opportunity to regain the Golan but refused to do so." Tlas' remarks are only the most recent in a series

As Israelis and Palestinians meet at the Erez junction, Syrian President Hafiz al-Asad will be watching closely. Before the West Bank/Gaza rioting, Syrian troop movements reminded Israelis of the 1973 Yom Kippur surprise attack, prompting a war scare. In the wake of the riots, Prime Minister Netanyahu came to Washington