Marc Lynch’s Testimony at the House Committee on Armed Services
Thank you, Chairman Hartzler and Ranking Member Moulton of this Subcommittee, for this invitation to speak about the critically important question of Iraqi stability after the fall of ISIS. The U.S.-led coalition has made impressive progress over the last three years towards containing, degrading, and ultimately defeating the Islamic State in Iraq. It is heartening that this committee is paying serious attention to what comes next. Nothing could be more important in order to consolidate these successes and avoid yet another recurrence of insurgency and state failure in Iraq. Representative Moulton has led the way on this with his presentation last year of a “Plan to Secure the Peace in Iraq.”1