Does Barack Obama’s foreign policy represent a return to multilateralism or a restoration of American Empire? He came out against the invasion of Iraq in his now famous speech in Chicago, but he also made it very clear that he is not opposed to all wars. Especially not the war in Afghanistan. Back in 2001, Richard Falk in the Nation Magazine got a lot of flack among progressives when he made the case that the US invasion of Afghanistan was a just war. Now with the war dragging on, the Taliban ascending, and US legitimacy weakened throughout the region what is the best way forward. On his tour of the Middle East Obama has reiterated his call to send additional troops to Afghanistan—at least 7,000—in order to fight what Time Magazine is calling the right war. So has the just war become the right war? Or is the United States looking to salvage victory from the ashes of defeat?

Here to take on some of these questions and to discuss the future of American foreign policy in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Central Asia are Frida Berrigan, Senior Program Associate with the New America Foundation’s Arms and Security Initiative, Arun Gupta writer and editor for The Indypendent, Jake Sherman Project Coordinator for the Center on International Cooperation, and Irshad Manji Director of the Moral Courage Project at New York University’s School of Public Service and the author of The Trouble With Islam Today.

The big issues: Israel/Palestine. Will anything change? Defense spending and the US sale of arms to the rest of the world. Obama’s said nothing on the topic. And style vs. substance. How much does Obama’s willingness to sit down and speak with leaders from Iran and Cuba matter? Does it truly signify a change in policy.

Oh, and the surge. Yes, everyone, not just Katie Couric, is talking about the surge and how magnificently it has worked. Gupta says we shouldn’t be fooled so easily. The surge has fomented sectarian violence and further divided Iraq. As Patrick Cockburn recently put it in the Nation, “The sectarian civil war between Sunni and Shia, which was at its height between the end of 2005 and the first half of 2007, has ebbed. This is not so much because of the Surge, but because there is nobody left to kill. Baghdad has become a largely Shia city. There are few mixed areas remaining.”

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