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A U.S. soldier watches as a statue of Iraq's President Saddam Hussein fall in central Baghdad, Iraq, in April 2003.

REUTERS/Goran Tomasevic

Was Iraq a success or failure?

On a visit to Iraq in the spring of 2021, I was chatting with a group of Iraqi and western friends – all current or former advisors to the Iraqi, US, or UK governments – when the conversation turned to whether the 2003 US-led war to depose Saddam Hussein’s regime had been worthwhile. The dogmatism, divisiveness, and emotion that characterized the debate in the run-up to the war were still evident. For some, ending the murderous brutality and atrocities of Saddam’s rule superseded any other concern. Others were more equivocal, pointing to the corruption, violence, and misrule of the US-bequeathed, post-2003 political order and the toll it has taken on the country.

On the 20th anniversary of the war, the question of whether Iraq is better or worse off and whether the cost in coalition lives and money was worth it is, almost inevitably, being revisited. But it is a feckless one. The reality of Iraq’s experience since 2003 cannot be captured by a simplistic dichotomy; the country is — as it always was — more complicated than that.

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"Peace" under authoritarian occupation isn't peaceful | Estonia's Kaja Kallas | GZERO World

"Peace" under authoritarian occupation isn't peaceful: Estonia's Kaja Kallas

Everyone knows that war is bad and peace is good, but what about the difference between peace and "peace"? Estonia's Prime Minister Kaja Kallas sat down with Ian Bremmer at the Munich Security Conference to discuss the war in Ukraine and how her perspective has changed since the Russian invasion began one year ago. Europe is a small region, says Kallas, and maintaining unity in the face of Russian aggression could come down to acknowledging European countries' lived experiences and not-so-distant history.

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A view shows Batman logo on a box of cocaine, said to be recovered by New Zealand Police.

New Zealand Police/Handout via REUTERS

Hard Numbers: Batman found on cocaine, Disney censors Simpsons, Nicaragua jails priests, Bard flub costs Google billions

3.2: In a possible indication that the Marvel universe is winning, Batman is now on cocaine. New Zealand’s navyintercepted a haul of 3.2 tons of the drug floating in the pacific. Many of the packets were labeled with the Dark Knight’s symbol, evidently a trademark of certain producers in South America.

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Aging Autocrats & Tech Bros: 2023's Top Risks | Quick Take | GZERO Media

Aging autocrats and tech bros: 2023's top risks

Ian Bremmer's Quick Take:

Hi everybody. Ian Bremmer here and a Happy New Year to you. It is 2023. Can still say Happy New Year because it's the beginning, it's the first week of January. I think all this week, that's perfectly fine. I wanted to spend a couple of minutes with Quick Take on our top risk, something we do every year. Been around for 25 years now as a firm. This is our anniversary. And I always try to give a sense of where the world is heading in the coming year. At the end of the year, we go back, we see what we got right, we see what we got wrong.

And this year, what's interesting about this year, it's kind of two sides to a very interesting coin. On the one hand, democracies, major democracies, and the institutions surrounding them, whether it's the European Union, or it's the G7, or NATO, the United States, and Brazil, and Canada, and Japan, these institutions, the countries, they look pretty stable. They're not about to fall apart.

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President Zelensky Goes to Washington | Quick Take | GZERO Media

Zelensky's welcome in the West reinforces message of unity

Ian Bremmer's Quick Take: Hi everybody, it's Ian Bremmer and President Zelensky, Volodymyr Zelensky is in the United States. It is his first trip out of his country in 10 months, in 300 days, since the Russian invasion began into Ukraine. I remember in the Munich security conference just a few days before the war started when we all knew that in an invasion was coming and NATO leaders, including President Joe Biden, got in touch with the Ukrainian president and said, "Can we evacuate you? Can we get you out of that country because you're likely to get killed if the Russians invade?" He said, "No." And he has led his country to mount a stalwart defense of their territory, fighting the Russians back now for almost a year, and indeed now traveling to the United States where he will most surely get a standing ovation, bipartisan, from both chambers of the House and Senate and meet with Biden and national security officials, and also celebrate the fact that democracy still means a lot, both in Ukraine and around the world.

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The State Of Democracy In The World | Quick Take | GZERO Media

Democracy is resilient - but so is authoritarianism around the world

Ian Bremmer's Quick Take: Hi everybody. Ian Bremmer here and a happy Monday to you. Time for a Quick Take to kick off your week. I thought I would talk about the state of democracy.

Of course, over the course of the last 10 years, there's been so much discussion of the world becoming more illiberal, lower case that more people in the world are living under authoritarian regimes or mixed governments, hybrid governments than living under pure democracy. In part because authoritarian states are growing more powerful, in part because some democracies, including the United States, are watching their systems, their institutions erode and watching their political leaders become de-legitimized.

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How Social Media Harms Democracy | Asia Society | GZERO Media

How social media harms democracy

Yes, foreign powers have tried to meddle in US elections. But for Ian Bremmer, external disinformation efforts pale in comparison to the internal damage Americans can do.

What's more, under its new ownership Twitter is so far unleashing more anger, hatred, and violence on social media, Bremmer says during a conversation with former Australian PM and Asia Society President and CEO Kevin Rudd at the Asia Society's headquarters in New York.

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Podcast: Can the US get its act together? Susan Glasser & Peter Baker on "the world’s greatest geopolitical crisis"

Listen: Whatever the US midterm elections are all about this time around, one thing is clear: the result will have global ripple effects on US relations with Russia, China, and American democracy itself. Ian Bremmer speaks to two of Washington’s top reporters: DC power couple and co-authors Susan Glasser, Washington columnist for The New Yorker, and Peter Baker, chief White House correspondent for The New York Times, in a GZERO World podcast recorded in front of a live audience in New York City. They discuss their bestselling new book on former president Trump “The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017-2021," the upcoming US midterms, and the state of American democracy in 2022.

Subscribe to the GZERO World Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your preferred podcast platform, to receive new episodes as soon as they're published.

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