The U.S. assumed the role of hegemon in the Middle East four decades ago and has frequently resorted to military intervention in what turned out to be a failed effort to promote U.S. interests and those of the region’s innocent bystanders.
In his insightful new book, Grand Delusion, The Rise and Fall of American Ambition in the Middle East, veteran U.S. diplomat and analyst Steven Simon looks back over a 40-year career, pinpoints grave U.S. policy mistakes and offers suggestions for an approach that better marries U.S. interests and those of the people of the Middle East.
Featured Speaker
Steven Simon, Robert E. Wilhelm Fellow in International Affairs at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Research Fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft
He served as the National Security Council senior director for counterterrorism in the Clinton White House and for the Middle East and North Africa in the Obama White House and in senior positions at the U.S. Department of State.
Moderator
Barbara Slavin, Distinguished Fellow, The Stimson Center and a lecturer at George Washington University
Prior to joining Stimson, she founded and directed the Future of Iran Initiative at the Atlantic Council and led a bi-partisan task force on Iran. The author of Bitter Friends, Bosom Enemies: Iran, the US and the Twisted Path to Confrontation (2007), she is a regular commentator on US foreign policy and Iran on NPR, PBS and C-Span.