Iraq after Daesh Politique étrangère, Vol. 82, No. 4, Winter 2017-2018

Going beyond the numerous claims of rupture, is Trump overturning the international order and the place occupied in it by the United States?

The Contrechamps column in this issue think yes, at least by his outright criticism of multilateralism. A criticism that could leave the country alone and side-lined by a multilateralism that is being re-established without it. However, Trump must also be seen as a symptom: that of the crisis of a liberal order which in recent years has divided people and played them off against each other, paving the way for populism of all kinds.

Will Iraq recover and how after decades of dictatorship, a US invasion, a civil war, and enforced fragmentation nowadays between the militias, communities, jihadists and outside influences? The key feature of this issue questions the future of the Iraqi state, the capital for an entire region where all the existing political structures seem to have broken up or disintegrated. Will the “sovereign, independent, and democratic” Iraq that President Obama hoped for, exist one day?

Issue 4/2017 of Politique étrangère sheds light on other major current international issues: how far can the North Korea/US confrontation go? What is the background to the Yemeni drama between military failure and a humanitarian disaster? How does Iranian power really work? Is Belgium the weak link in the European fight against terrorism? Does the vigour of the Chinese think tanks reflect a new grand strategy by Beijing to open up to the world and have more influence in it?

IRAQ AFTER DAESH

Introduction: Iraq, the Permanent Laboratory, by Dorothée Schmid

Has Iraq Ever Been Able to Exist?, by Jolyon Howorth

Shiite Groups in Iraq: National Issues and Transnational Dimensions, by Hebatalla Taha and Clément Therme

Kurdistan: Independence on Balance, by Adel Bakawan

Vengeance: Mobilizing Motivation of the Islamic State, by Myriam Benraad

COUNTER ANALYSIS
TRUMP : BREAKING THE WORLD ORDER

International Order and Trump’s America, by Pierre Vimont (read the article in French)

Saving the Liberal Order from Itself, by Jennifer Lind (read the article in English)

CURRENT AFFAIRS

Yemen: Political-Judicial Imbroglio, Humanitarian Disaster, Military Stalemate, by François Frison-Roche

North Korea-US: How Far Will the Confrontation Go?, by Antoine Bondaz (read the article in French)