Panels & Presentations
Featured Presentation:
Looking Back: The Gulf War
Foreign Policy Research Institute
February 24, 2021
What lessons have we learned from our past engagements? On the 30th anniversary of the Gulf War, join FPRI’s John Nagl and Samuel Helfont for this month’s Main Line Briefing. Nagl and Helfont will look back on the legacy of the war 30 years later and talk about the key takeaways from Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm. They will also discuss how we can make sure we are learning the right lessons from our current engagements, both military and diplomatic.
To read Dr. Helfont’s recent article about the Gulf War for Texas National Security Review, please click here:
Compulsion in Religion: Saddam Hussein, Islam, and the Roots of Insurgencies
Foreign Policy Research Institute
Geopolitics with Granieri
April 11, 2018
In his new book from Oxford University Press, Samuel Helfont investigates the roots of the religious insurgencies which erupted in Iraq following the American-led invasion in 2003. This book relies on access to the former regime’s internal archives and secret files to challenge many of the underlying assumptions of American plans to occupy and rebuild Iraq. When the American-led invasion destroyed the regime’s authoritarian structures in 2003, it unleashed the forces that these structures were designed to contain, creating an atmosphere infused with religion, but lacking the checks provided by the former regime. Groups such as the Sadrists, al-Qaida in Iraq, and eventually the Islamic State emerged out of that context to tear the country apart.