Thucydides and 'Chalkidic' Torone (IV.110.1)

This article is a reply to the Thucydidean part of J.K. Papadopoulos in OJA 15 (1996) 151–81 and is concerned with the meaning of 'Chalkidic Torone' at Thucydides IV.110.1 (and of 'Chalkidic Olynthos' at IV.123). Various meanings, canvassed in previous scholarship, are considered. Sense (1) is geographical, 'Torone in Chalkidike' sense (2) is political, 'Torone the member of the Chalkidic State or League'. Both these are rejected in favour of some translation of 'Chalkidic' which implies either colonial descent from Euboian Chalkis (sense (3)) or ethnic affiliation to a local and non-Euboian 'Chalkidic genos' (sense (4)). It is argued, contrary to Papadopoulos, that Thucydides in the fifth century, and perhaps Ephorus in the fourth, did after all think in terms of sense (3), but that non-Euboian Chalkidians, if any, may have appropriated Euboian origins to themselves, partly for imperialistic reasons and partly to assert their hellenism, surrounded as they were by non-Greek neighbours. (Analogies are suggested for such 'propagandistic' behaviour.) That is, senses (3) and (4) can be reconciled.     

Myths, Motivations and 'Misunderestimations': the Bush Administration and Iraq

This article explores the myths and motivations behind US foreign policy towards Iraq in America's 'war on terrorism'. It argues that the foreign policy of the Bush administration is widely misunderstood and that much of the debate about Iraq policy that has taken place has been conducted at an unhelpful level of analysis. It addresses arguments that the Bush administration is motivated by oil, revenge or hubris as well as the more mainstream arguments that an attack on Iraq would provoke instability through the entire Middle East, as well as encouraging further acts of and support for murderous terrorism; that there is no urgency to act against Iraq as containment and deterrence remain adequate means to manage this threat; and that Iraq should be a lower priority than dealing with North Korea. It does this by analysing the development of American foreign policy thinking on the war on terrorism, what motivates it, and why it rejects the arguments of its critics. The article explains the intellectual process by which the US decided upon this course of action and how Europe's failure to understand this process added to its incomprehension of American policy. It does not argue that European's opposition would have been swept aside had they better understood the Bush administration, the central disagreement about the necessity and prudence of military action versus containment remains, but that such an understanding would have allowed for a better and more focused level of debate than the one which has got us to this point. Nor does it argue that the Bush administration approach is necessarily persuasive or justified, merely that its case is reasoned and explicable in terms of America's foreign policy traditions.