Inshallah and Ojalá
Inshallah and Ojalá – The lessons of counterinsurgency and nation-building in Colombia can also apply to the Arab world. By James Stavridis, Foreign Policy.
A 50-year ideological struggle, hundreds of thousands killed, millions displaced, mass graves, murder, rape, torture, a virulent insurgency threatening the overthrow of the entire social order, a rebel enclave carved out of the heart of a big nation. It sounds a lot like the Middle East today, but the grim tale of the tape also applies to the beautiful Andean nation of Colombia over the past half-century.
Today, however, there is enormous progress in Colombia. And it's worth pausing, if not to celebrate these accomplishments quite yet, then at least to consider the lessons we might apply as we grapple with seemingly intractable problems across the Arab world…
