The proximate cause of Iraq's unraveling was the increasing authoritarian, sectarian, and corrupt conduct of the Iraqi government and its leader after the departure of the last U.S. combat forces in 2011.
Interpretation
The quote highlights how the failures of the Iraqi government post-2011 led to instability and chaos in the country.
David Petraeus emphasizes the significant role that the poor governance characterized by authoritarianism, sectarianism, and corruption played in the destabilization of Iraq following the withdrawal of U.S. troops in 2011. By pointing to these factors as proximate causes, he suggests that leadership decisions and government actions are critical in determining the stability and order within a nation, especially in the aftermath of foreign interventions.
In practice
This quote could be used in a political debate to illustrate the consequences of poor governance.
There is nothing I can do to undo what I did. I can only say again how sorry I am to those I let down and then strive to go forward with a greater sense of humility and purpose, and with gratitude to those who stood with me during a very difficult chapter in my life.
I considered our British comrades to rank with the finest men and women of any armed service in the world. And I know that my fellow American soldiers - and those of the other coalition countries under my command - valued very highly the professional expertise, capability, courage, and determination of our British partners on the battlefield.
In the 101st Airborne Division headquarters in Mosul, we had a sign on the wall. It was a question that we would ask ourselves before every new operation or policy initiative. It asked: Will this policy or operation take more bad guys off the streets than it creates by its conduct?
The idea is to go to bed every night with fewer enemies than you had in the morning.
We periodically note that there are no silver bullets, there are no magic formulas, there's no single action or component of the overall... comprehensive civil-military approach.
At least from a national security standpoint, none of the problems the U.S. and U.K. face will become easier to solve if the U.K. is out of the E.U.; on the contrary, I fear that a 'Brexit' would only make our world even more dangerous and difficult to manage.
We the people tell the government what to do, it doesn't tell us.
No medieval monarch in the whole of British history ever had such power as every modern British Prime Minister has in his or her hands. Nor does any American President have power approaching this
There is one transcendant advantage belonging to the province of the State governments . . . -I mean the ordinary administration of criminal and civil justice.
The President can exercise no power which cannot be fairly and reasonably traced to some specific grant of power in the Federal Constitution or in an act of Congress passed in pursuance thereof. There is no undefined residuum of power which he can exercise because it seems to him to be in the public interest.
There is no right government except good government.
Whensoever the General Government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force.
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