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Readers of our April 7 story on John McCain criticized his support for the Iraq War to fight radicalism. One wrote, "Iraq under Saddam was solidly secular … eliminating him was not productive." A reader of Michael Hastings's April 7 piece on his fiancée's death in Iraq blamed Bush and McCain for the war.
McCain on Radical Islam
In "The Evolution of the McCain Doctrine" (April 7), you write that "after 9/11, [John] McCain declared radical Islam to be the 'transcendent challenge' of our time, and argued to take on Iraq even before George W. Bush did." Say what? Iraq under Saddam Hussein was a solidly secular nation that had no use for radical Islam or its practitioners. Saddam may have been a brutal dictator, but he suppressed groups like Al Qaeda, which he perceived as a threat to his hold on power, and stood in opposition to the fundamentalist regime in Iran. By eliminating him, America granted the fundamentalists a boon that they could not have hoped to achieve on their own, hardly a productive response to our "transcendent challenge." Something doesn't add up here.
Harvey Wachtel
Kew Gardens, New York
A Senseless Death
Michael Hastings's terribly sad story on the death of his fiancée in Iraq moved me deeply (" 'I'm Sorry We Couldn't Do More'," April 7). This is one more thing we can thank George W. Bush for, not Saddam Hussein, not Osama bin Laden, but Bush and those who think like him. Interestingly, in the same issue, your cover story, "The World According to John McCain," appears to say that McCain is one of them. When will America learn from its mistakes?
Ronald Steers Mckinney
Mexico City, Mexico
Read More on World
Editor ' s Note
In "The World According to John McCain" (April 7), NEWSWEEK described a meeting at the 2006 Munich security conference in which Sen. John McCain allegedly erupted at the German foreign minister, who McCain thought was being insufficiently tough on the brutal regime in Belarus. There are, however, conflicting versions of the episode, and we should have made that clear. Some people who were in the room at the time dispute the account, and others who recall a brief flare-up of anger from McCain (which the senator denies), believed the incident was minor, based on a misunderstanding caused by a translation problem, and was quickly cleared up. Senator McCain should have been given an opportunity to give his version of events in the original story, and we regret that the piece did not note the different recollections of the moment, including the denials that there was any display of anger.
Struggling to Remake the Army
I applaud NEWSWEEK for getting right how America's officer corps has been transformed five years into the Iraq War ("Scions of the Surge," March 24), but this debate started many years ago. I used to be one of Capt. Tim Wright's West Point classmates. As an adviser to the Iraqi Army in 2005, I routinely found my team and myself at odds with our senior commanders over how to win the war. In military parlance, whoever controls or retains the key terrain possesses a decisive advantage. My chain of command continually emphasized that the Iraqi population was the key terrain. However, the same chain of command, despite my team's pleas to move onto the Iraqi base, rejected outright our request due to the "risk." Our forces migrated to larger and larger U.S. bases, complete with coffee shops and a Burger King. Same as Captain Wright, we expressed our thoughts on cohabiting with the Iraqis to an incoming American unit, only to be dismissed by our senior officers again. I left the Army after six years in the infantry and entered business school like many of my peers. The war has vanished from my life not because I wanted it to, but because I became a "normal" American. Staying connected to the war in a meaningful way was difficult, even for someone who fought it on and off for almost two years. The modern military experience is one of incredible burdens and isolation. Rather than your cover moniker, "The Petraeus Generation," a more fitting description might be "The Decoupled Generation."
Brad Thompson
Atlanta, Georgia
As an "old generation" soldier, I find it gratifying to see an Army leadership finally emerge that understands we must be prepared for all contingencies. When I arrived as a young lieutenant colonel on the U.S. Army's Command and General Staff College faculty in 1981, my instructions were to keep the counterinsurgency doctrine alive until such time as we could have leadership that would "get it." At that time the Army's premier school for developing senior leadership devoted nine hours out of a curriculum of more than 1,600 hours to counterinsurgency. When I left the faculty for another assignment, we were up to about 33 hours, still woefully inadequate. Thankfully, Gen. David Petraeus, Capt. Tim Wright and many other fine leaders at all levels of our Army "get it."
Col.James Young
U.S. Army (Ret.)
Pinehurst, North Carolina
Imagine if the mayor and police chief of Chicago or Los Angeles came forth with a program for limiting gang violence by paying gang members to join the police and stop their violent activity. Imagine what the reaction of the surge supporters would be. Imagine what the payouts to the insurgent groups in Iraq could have been used for in this country (does New Orleans still resonate with anyone?). What happens when the money to pay these groups in Iraq runs out, or, better still, what happens if a group such as Al Qaeda or the Iranians comes in with an offer of more money? What kind of allies will these insurgents be, whose allegiance must be bought and paid for?
Jeffrey J. Sieburg
Lodi, Wisconsin
An Independent Political Entity
You ran a map accompanying "China's Dangerous Game" (April 7) to illustrate the area of the historical Tibetan settlement. By using red to cover both the Chinese mainland and Taiwan, however, you gave the false impression that Taiwan is part of Chinese territory. The fact is, the two sides across the Taiwan Strait have been separate political entities for nearly six decades, and communist China has never exercised jurisdiction over democratic Taiwan. While the international society voices its support of China and protests its policy in Tibet, the 23 million people on Taiwan need the world to support their longstanding adherence to the universal values of freedom and democracy by recognizing Taiwan as a different political entity from China.
Fangyan Lin
Hong Kong
Embracing Roman Catholicism
Your article about the baptism of Magdi Allam upset me because you did not understand the point of his choice ("Christian Provocateurs and Muslim Moderation," April 7). Allam decided, with the freedom that only Christ can give us, to embrace the Roman Catholic religion. It was not a provocation; he simply embraced what he believes is the answer, a way to be happy and free.
Valentina Villa
Milan, Italy
What ' s in a Name?
Having a challenging name myself, I find Barack Obama's candidacy for president very encouraging ("When Barry Became Barack," March 31). He hasn't altered his identity in order to be accepted, as many immigrants feel obligated to do. I am sure his candidacy will go a long way in educating us all why neither gender nor a foreign name should affect one's perception of an individual.
Vivek Mehrotra
Santa Clara, California
Please run a cover with a photo OF a young Hillary Clinton as a commencement speaker at Wellesley or as a law student at Yale. That story could include details of her lifelong dedication to the service of others and her country. She showed great leadership qualities when she was young. Also, was it fair of you to imply Obama is the Democratic nominee for president when people in some states had not yet voted?
Hannah Provence Donigan
Commerce, Michigan
Your story on Barack Obama reminds me of another Illinois politician who seemed to be soft-spoken and able to move people to great things. He also had a humble beginning and got this country through some very difficult times. With little Washington, D.C., experience, he was able to surround himself with good advisers. People questioned whether he could be commander in chief. If Barack Obama can be one quarter as good a president as Abraham Lincoln, he will be many times better than anyone we have seen in a generation. Originally from Chicago, I know whom I will vote for in the fall.
Alan H. Weiner
Berwyn Heights, Maryland
That wonderful picture of Barack Obama with his Kenyan stepgrandmother brought a smile to my face and a tear to my eye. There's no mistaking that "I could just bust my buttons" proud grandma grin! It's good to see an affirmation of truly universal emotions.
Peggy L. Trivilino
Nashua, New Hampshire
The kind of transcultural experience Barack Obama has lived over years and decades may be excellent preparation for the challenges facing him if he's elected president. It could prove more valuable than any degree of foreign-policy expertise that his rival in the Democratic Party claims as her strength. The speech he delivered on race relations in Philadelphia on March 18 was brilliant not only in terms of rhetoric—he was always good at that—but also in his grasp of the issue. The big hope is that he will be capable of handling conflict and crisis on a number of other levels, both domestically and internationally. If he fulfills at least part of that promise, the odd bit of poetic license he might have taken in an autobiographical book does not concern me in the slightest.
Werner Radtke
Paderborn, Germany
The New Nano, a Visionary ' s Dream
Apropos your Feb. 25 cover story, "Actual Size,'' the Nano is a truly revolutionary product from the point of view of the lower-middle-class Indian who wants to take his family out for a drive in a four-wheeler. If Ratan Tata is going to provide a car for the price of a laptop, he is motivated by more than just doing business. In fact, it is his commitment to an idea conceived to benefit society at large. An industrialist of Tata's standing can—and does—earn handsome profits from any business he enters into, but this small-car venture has not been conceived with big profits in mind. It has been a visionary's dream, and the driving force behind the project has been Tata's passion. It remains to be seen if the giants of the auto industry in the West find the Nano's design and its capabilities worthwhile, but with its projected fuel efficiency and economic running costs, this little thing could certainly endear itself to many first-time car owners. In fact, there might be more takers for the Nano in foreign markets than at home. Yes, the concerns of pollution and traffic jams raised by some people seem genuine, but that does not mean that menaces of that sort would remain under check if there were no Nano on Indian roads. Environmental issues need to be addressed by quickly phasing out inefficient engines and enforcing stricter emission norms.
R. K. Sudan
Jammu, India
Japan ' s Declining Interest in Cars
Is Akiko Kashiwagi Japanese or Japanese-American? Or is he a car manufacturer fearing unemployment? Reading his article "A Post-Car Society" (Feb. 25), I thought, only an American would consider Japan's declining interest in cars "a worrisome trend" and a "state of decay." But I'm an American and I think it sounds like a trend I wish would strike Europe. Here, SUVs on the narrow, often cobbled, streets look like elephants, and the "herds" get larger all the time. The Japanese, says Kashiwagi, are more interested in smaller, hipper gadgets and use the country's well-functioning public transportation. Again, this sounds like a European politician's dream. While old computers may end their days in an open ditch in Ghana, their impact on the environment is certainly minor compared with a car. Go into any toy store and check out the area at the front, the one with all the dumb little plastic things that fall apart 10 minutes after they're purchased. No kid in the world would miss this trash if it disappeared, and the planet would be grateful. The only people who would make a fuss are the workers who make these things. At least, those who are older than 14. While I understand their dilemma and am not as hardhearted as my flippant tone indicates, I miss a sense of proportion here. Production and consumption of things nobody wants, whether toy cars lacking wheels or real cars lacking buyers, are at best wasteful and at worst destructive. This is such a 21st-century dilemma, but it concerns our future.
Frances Fischer
Svendborg, Denmark
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