In December, 2006, the Iraq Study Group released its report on the Iraq war. A cornerstone to that report was the recommendation of a “new diplomatic offensive.” “The study group recognizes that US relationships with Iran and Syria involve difficult issues that must be resolved…However, the United States should consider incentives to try to engage them constructively, much as it did successfully with Libya.” This conclusion was based on the realization that a lasting peace in Iraq must necessarily take into account the concerns and influence of its neighbors.

The Iraq Study Group was not a bunch of flaming liberals. Co-chaired by former Secretary of State James Baker, the Group included among its members Sandra Day O’Connor, Lawrence Eagleburger, Edwin Meese, Vernon Jordan, and Leon Panetta.

Needless to say, President Bush rejected the report out of hand, opting instead for an ill-conceived “surge” that has served to preserve the status quo while pushing the possibility for a lasting peace even further into the future. The “surge” will end someday and, if things do not change, Sunni and Shia forces will once again push the country to the brink of civil war.

President Bush yesterday compared Barack Obama’s expressed willingness to talk to leaders of Iran to Neville Chamberlain’s appeasement of Hitler prior to World War II. Asked to denounce this outrageous assertion, John McCain repeated it.

Barack Obama is not proposing anything outside the mainstream of informed political opinion. If he is an appeaser, then so are James Baker, Sandra Day O’Connor and the other members of the Iraq Study Group. There is too much at stake in this presidential election to allow candidates and their surrogates to descend into cartoonish thinking and fear-mongering.

Joseph L. Gerken
Buffalo

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