Brookings Event Announcement: Plan B: A Containment Strategy for Iraq in Civil War

    WASHINGTON, Jan. 25 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- With each passing day,
 Iraq sinks deeper into the abyss of civil war. The President has staked
 everything on one last-chance effort to quell the fighting and jumpstart a
 process of political reconciliation and economic reconstruction. Should
 this last effort fail, the United States is likely to very quickly have to
 determine how best to handle an Iraq that will be erupting into a Bosnia-
 or Lebanon-like all-out civil war. The history of such wars is that they
 are disastrous for all parties, but the United States will have little
 choice but to try to stave off disaster as best it can.
     To help start to provide a solution to that dilemma, the Saban Center
 for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution will unveil a new
 report, "Things Fall Apart: Containing the Spillover from an Iraqi Civil
 War," by Daniel L. Byman and Kenneth M. Pollack. This policy paper examines
 the history of some dozen recent civil wars to reveal the general patterns
 by which such conflicts can "spill over" into neighboring states, causing
 further civil wars or regional conflicts. From this history, the authors
 propose a set of policy options that the United States could employ to try
 to contain the "spill over" effects of a full-scale Iraqi civil war.
     After the program, panelists will take audience questions.
 
                            Monday, January 29, 2007
                             10:30 a.m.- 12:00 p.m.
 
                           The Brookings Institution
                                Falk Auditorium
                         1775 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
                                 Washington, DC
 
                                   Moderator:
                                  Martin Indyk
                           Senior Fellow and Director
                      Saban Center for Middle East Policy
 
     Authors:
 
     Daniel L. Byman
     Nonresident Senior Fellow
     Saban Center for Middle East Policy
 
     Kenneth M. Pollack Senior Fellow and Director of Research
     Saban Center for Middle East Policy
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 +1-202-797-6105 or
            register online at http://onlinepressroom.net/brookings/
 
 

SOURCE The Brookings Institution