“Irakcracy”, is how general Petraeus, commander of the American Central Command, termed the special form of democracy, which might just work in Iraq, so strongly divided. Whereby he simply meant to indicate that this form of democracy cannot but differ from what we understand by it in the west.

Petraeus, born from a Dutch father, has since November last year been in charge of the region where the largest number of armed conflicts is taking place at present: the Middle East and countries like Afghanistan and Pakistan. He presented a concise survey of the huge problems which he as commander of more than 230,000 American forces is dealing with on a daily basis.

Those problems range from religious and ethnic acts of violence in Iraq, the nuclear threat from Iran, piracy and smuggling off the coast of Somalia to the increasingly unstable situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

He also tried to clarify how the Americans think they can deal with the problems. Even better cooperation with local parties and other partner countries, genuine protection of the civilian population and ruthless persecution of those who strive to foil the peace process are some of those measures. In addition, he talked about the damage that was wreaked by the torture that took place in the Abu Ghraib prison. “It is of the essence that we should act in accordance with our own values in this region as well. If we fail to do so, as we have done in Abu Ghraib, we shall be paying a heavy price for that for many years to come”, explained Petraeus.

Apart from Petraeus, veteran lieutenant-colonel James Megellas (1917) addressed the audience. As a lieutenant Megellas was involved among other things in operation Market Garden, which was commemorated extensively last week in cities including Eindhoven, Nijmegen and Arnhem. (HK)/.