May 26, 2018

Dear SHAFR Council:

We are writing to express our deep disappointment and dismay over the decision to invite David Petraeus to deliver the keynote lecture at SHAFR’s annual meeting in Philadelphia this year.

As historians we stand by the principles of free speech and inquiry, and we recognize that our work often involves analyzing and engaging with the views of policymakers with whom we may disagree. We acknowledge Petraeus’ right to speak his mind and to present at SHAFR panels. There is a difference, however, between engaging current and former policymakers and elevating their positions with the special honor of a keynote lecture. There is also a difference between a free exchange of ideas and the payment of individuals to espouse their views with SHAFR funds.

Our opposition to Petraeus’ keynote stems in part from the democratic principle that historians should be cognizant of the excesses of state power, particularly with respect to military intervention and war. By inviting Petraeus to deliver a keynote speech, SHAFR is elevating an individual who held positions of enormous power within the military and intelligence apparatuses of the national security state.

That said, it is Petraeus’ particular legacy that we find most troubling. As Commander of Multi-National Forces in Iraq, head of U.S. Central Command, Commander of U.S. and I.S.A.F Forces in Afghanistan, and director of the C.I.A., Petraeus played a major role in shaping the failed counterinsurgency wars of the post 9/11 era that left a legacy of destruction and devastation in Iraq and Afghanistan and destabilized the entire Middle East, the consequences of which we are still living with today.

Throughout his tenure, Petraeus argued that counterinsurgency constituted a more intelligent and humane form of warfare, one that focused less on brute force and more on “winning hearts and minds.” However, there is a sharp contrast between what Petraeus said about counterinsurgency and what counterinsurgency actually entailed. The 2007 “surge” in Iraq was preceded by the ethnic cleansing of Sunni minorities by the Shiite majority with whom Petraeus aligned. The temporary decline in violence masked the spread of a pervasive system of sectarian control, aided and abetted by the United States, that contributed to the rise of terrorist organizations, including I.S.I.S. [1] The killing of thousands of civilians in Fallujah and other cities belied Petraeus’ narrative of the conflict [2].

Petraeus’ legacy in Afghanistan also highlights the contrast between the official mythology and the actual war. As national-security journalist Spencer Ackerman writes, “Petraeus’ mouth was saying ‘counterinsurgency,’ with its focus on protecting civilians from violence, but in practice, he was far more reliant on air strikes and commando raids. He was even touting enemy body counts as measures of success.” [3] Numerous studies, including one conducted by New York University’s Center on International Cooperation, concluded that these operations further inflamed the insurgency in Afghanistan, perpetuating a conflict that continues to this day. [4]

Ackerman and other journalists have since come to regret the role that they and the rest of the media played in cultivating Petraeus’ reputation and status as a “cult” heroic figure. Ackerman writes, “Some of us who egotistically thought our coverage of Petraeus and counterinsurgency was so sophisticated were perpetuating myths without fully realizing it.” [5] Historians should be wary of repeating this mistake. Petraeus’ keynote amounts to an unnecessary and dangerous extension of this phenomenon into our organization.

We also oppose Petraeus’ keynote on the grounds that his legacy contributes to a broader pattern of whitewashing the history of U.S. imperial violence. From his 1987 graduate school thesis, “The American Military and Lessons of Vietnam” to the 2006 U.S. Counterinsurgency Manual, Petraeus has made a concerted effort to mute the devastation and atrocities of the Vietnam War and other counterinsurgencies past in order to revitalize counterinsurgency in the twenty-first century. The 2006 COIN Field Manual that Petraeus helped to write and popularize highlights positive examples of counterinsurgency from Malaya, Algeria, Vietnam, and El Salvador to be revitalized and emulated in the post 9/11 era. [6] Such attempts to sanitize and instrumentalize the violent history of these conflicts threaten to undermines the very core of SHAFR’s mission and accomplishments. By inviting Petraeus to deliver a keynote at SHAFR, the organization is elevating the dangerous myths that Marilyn Young, Lloyd Gardner, and other great SHAFR leaders worked so hard to dismantle in the past. [7] This is not to mention the professional and personal lapses that led to Petraeus’ resignation from the CIA, which tarnished his reputation and should have disqualified him as a keynote speaker at SHAFR or anywhere else.

For all of these reasons, many SHAFR members and attendees who feel similarly disheartened will be speaking with their feet, simply by not attending the talk. However, we feel a need to speak out more directly, for not doing so risks normalizing the situation.

We hope we can use this moment as an opportunity to include more voices in the event. We propose that the lecture be reframed as a discussion format led by a SHAFR moderator who would pose pre-submitted questions and follow-ups to the speaker. These questions would not be given to Petraeus in advance. The platform would not be for Petraeus but rather for a discussion and debate about the Iraq and Afghanistan wars more generally.

Moving forward, we propose that, as a matter of policy, the program committee should create an opportunity for discussion and debate when inviting keynote speakers. We look forward to working with you to continue building SHAFR into a more inclusive, independent-minded, and democratic organization.

Notes:

[1] Charlotte F. Blatt, “Operational Success, Strategic Failure: Assessing the 2007 Iraq Troop Surge,” Parameters Vol. 47, No. 1 (Spring 2017): 44-55.

[2] Ross Caputi, The Justice for Fallujah Project, http://thefallujahproject.org/home/node/57

[3] Spencer Ackerman, “How I Was Drawn Into the Cult of David Petraeus,” Wired, Nov. 11, 2012,

https://www.wired.com/2012/11/petraeus-cult-2/

[4] “Separating the Taliban From Al Qaeda: The Core of Success in Afghanistan,” NYU Center on International Cooperation, Feb. 1, 2011.

[5] Ackerman, op. cit.

[6] U.S. Army/Marine Corps, “Counterinsurgency,” FM 3-24, December 2006, https://usacac.army.mil/cac2/Repository/Materials/COIN-FM3-24.pdf

[7] Eds. Lloyd Gardner and Marilyn Young, Iraq and the Lessons of Vietnam: Or, How Not to Learn From the Past (New York: The New Press, 2008).

Sincerely,

SHAFR Members

Hannah Gurman, Clinical Associate Professor, New York University

Amy C. Offner, Assistant Professor, University of Pennsylvania

Patrick William Kelly, Postdoctoral Fellow, Buffett Institute for Global Studies, Northwestern University

Adrian De Leon, PhD Candidate, University of Toronto

Megan Black, Assistant Professor, London School of Economics

Paul Adler, Lecturer, Harvard University History and Literature Concentration

Andrew Friedman, Associate Professor, Haverford College

April Merleaux, Assistant Professor of US Foreign Policy & Empire Studies, Hampshire College

Ryan Archibald, PhD Candidate, University of Washington, Seattle

Paul A. Kramer, Associate Professor, Vanderbilt University

Naoko Shibusawa, Associate Professor, Brown University

Sarah Bridger, Associate Professor, California Polytechnic State University

Jeremy Kuzmarov, Professor of History, Tulsa Community College

Betsy Beasley, Member, Institute for Advanced Study

Stuart Schrader, Fellow, Harvard University

Katherine Marino, Assistant Professor, Ohio State University

Mark Bradley, Professor, University of Chicago

Daniel Bessner, Assistant Professor, University of Washington

Andrea Onate-Madrazo, Assistant Professor, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo

Stephen Wertheim, Lecturer, Birkbeck, University of London

Christian G. Appy, Professor of History, University of Massachusetts

Henry Gorman, PhD Candidate, Vanderbilt University

Masuda Hajimu, Associate Professor, National University of Singapore

E. Kyle Romero, Ph.D. Candidate, Vanderbilt University

Colleen Woods, Assistant Professor, University of Maryland

Nicole Sackley, Associate Professor of History, University of Richmond

Brad Simpson, Associate Professor, University of Connecticut

Jessica Levy, PhD Candidate, The Johns Hopkins University

Shaine Scarminach, Ph.D. Candidate, University of Connecticut

Carol Anderson, Professor, Emory University

Konstantin Dierks, Assistant Professor, Indiana University

Emily Conroy-Krutz, Assistant Professor, Michigan State University

Brittany Edmoundson, PhD Candidate, New York University

Wen-Qing Ngoei, Assistant Professor, Nanyang Technological University

Oliver Charbonneau, Instructor, Brock University

Mario Del Pero, Professor, SciencesPo Paris

Penny Von Eschen, Professor, Cornell University

Sheyda Jahanbani, Associate Professor of History, University of Kansas

Shaul Mitelpunkt, Assistant Professor, University of York

Ilaria Scaglia, Lecturer, Aston University

Scott Laderman, Professor of History, University of Minnesota, Duluth

Karine Walther, Associate Professor, Georgetown University-Qatar

Anne L. Foster, Associate Professor, Indiana State University

Rachel Bunker, Graduate Student, Rutgers University

Christy Thornton, Assistant Professor of Sociology, Johns Hopkins University

Chase Madar, Adjunct Professor, NYU Gallatin

Osamah F. Khalil, Assoc. Professor, History, Syracuse University, Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs

Meghan Mettler, Assistant Professor, Upper Iowa University

Jeanna L Kinnebrew, Ph.D. Candidate, Boston University

Sarah Miller-Davenport, Lecturer, University of Sheffield

Julio Capó, Jr., Assistant Professor of History + Commonwealth Honors College, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

Brian DeLay, Associate Professor of History, University of California, Berkeley

Sam Lebovic, Assistant Professor, George Mason University

Sam Klug, PhD Candidate, Harvard University

Sean Malloy, Associate Professor, UC Merced

Chris Dietrich, Associate Professor, Fordham University

Audra J. Wolfe, Independent Scholar

Jennifer M. Miller, Assistant Professor, Dartmouth College

Sean Case, PhD Candidate, Boston University

Kaeten Mistry, Senior Lecturer, University of East Anglia

A. Naomi Paik, Assistant Professor, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

Monica Kim, Assistant Professor, New York University

Robert Buzzanco, Professor of History, University of Houston

Jayita Sarkar, Assistant Professor, Boston University

John Munro, Associate Professor, Saint Mary's University, Halifax, Canada

Renata Keller, Assistant Professor, University of Nevada, Reno

Peter James Hudson, Assistant Professor of African American Studies and History, UCLA

Malcolm M Craig, Senior Lecturer in American History, Liverpool John Moores University

Hidetaka Hirota, Substitute Assistant Professor, The City University of New York-City College

Daniel Immerwahr, Associate Professor, Northwestern University

Milorad Lazic, PhD candidate, The George Washington University

Michael Sherry, Richard W. Leopold Professor of History, Northwestern University

Julia Rose Kraut, Fellow, New-York Historical Society

David Webster, Associate Professor, Bishop's University

George White, Jr., Associate Professor of History and Chair, York College, CUNY

Michael A. Hill, PhD Candidate, University of Kansas

Brian D'Haeseleer, Assistant Professor of History, Lyon College

Stephen Macekura, Assistant Professor, Indiana University

Jessica Chapman, Associate Professor, Williams College

David Kieran, Assistant Professor of History, Washington & Jefferson College

Lloyd Gardner, Professor Emeritus, Rutgers University

Keisha N. Blain, Assistant Professor of History, University of Pittsburgh

Margaret MacDonald Power, Professor and Chair, Department of Humanities, Illinois Tech

Elizabeth Ingleson, Lecturer, University of Sydney

Megan Threlkeld, Associate Professor of History, Denison University

Sean Fear, Lecturer, University of Leeds

Edwin Anton Martini, Professor and Associate Dean, Western Michigan University

Brooke L Blower, Associate Professor, Boston University

Carly Goodman, Mellon/ACLS Public Fellow, American Friends Service Committee

Roger Peace, Independent scholar

Michael Barany, Society of Fellows, Dartmouth College

Maurice Jr. M. Labelle, Assistant Professor of History, University of Saskatchewan

Zach Fredman, Assistant Professor, Duke Kunshan University

Karen Miller, Professor, LaGuardia CC & the CUNY Graduate Center

Laura A. Belmonte, Professor , Oklahoma State University

David Fitzgerald, Lecturer in History, University College Cork

Dael Norwood, Assistant Professor, Binghamton University

Tom Tunstall Allcock, Lecturer in American History, The University of Manchester

David J. Snyder, Clinical Associate Professor, University of South Carolina

Lili M. Kim, Associate Professor of History and Global Migrations, Hampshire College

Dirk Bonker, Associate Professor of History, Duke University

Irene Gendzier, Professor Emeritus, Boston University

Mildred Elizabeth Sanders, Professor of Government, Cornell University

Martin J Sherwin, University Professor of History, George Mason University

Derek N. Buckaloo, Professor of History, Coe College

John Gee, Ph.D. Candidate, Harvard University

Thomas M Williamsen, Emeritus, Appalachian State University

Arnold A. Offner, Cornelia Hugel Professor of History (Emeritus), Lafayette College

Kyle Burke, Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow, Northwestern University

Thomas G. Paterson, Emeritus Professor of History, University of Connecticut

Federico Romero, Professor, European University Institute

Brian S. Mueller, Independent Scholar

Andrew W. Bell, Ph.D. Candidate, Boston University

Benjamin Coates, Associate Professor, Wake Forest University

Meredith Oda, Assistant Professor, University of Nevada, Reno

Perin Gurel, Assistant Professor, University of Notre Dame

Ruth Rosen, Professor Emeritus, University of California, Davis

Suzanna Reiss, Associate Professor, University of Hawaii Manoa

Elisabeth Leake, Lecturer in International History, University of Leeds

Robert McGreevey, Associate Professor of History, The College of New Jersey

Stella Krepp, Assistant Professor, University of Bern

Justin F. Jackson, Assistant Professor of History, Bard College at Simon's Rock

Gregg French, Sessional Instructor, University of Windsor

Lubna Qureshi, Lecturer, Stockholm University

David Myer Temin, Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Michigan-Ann Arbor

Brian Rouleau, Associate Professor of History, Texas A&M University

Walter Lawrence Hixson, Distinguished Professor, University of Akron

Nate George, PhD Candidate, Rice University

Frank Paul L. Gerits, Lecturer in the History of International Relations, Utrecht University

Patrick Chung, Assistant Professor, University of North Florida

Carolyn Eisenberg, Professor, Hofstra University

Justin E. Burch, PhD Candidate, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Jonathan Isaac Ng, PhD Candidate, Northwestern University

Bevan Sewell, Assistant Professor, University of Nottingham

David S. Painter, Associate Professor, Georgetown University

Ben Offiler, Senior Lecturer in History, Sheffield Hallam University

Fabian Hilfrich, Senior Lecturer/Associate Professor, University of Edinburgh

Patrick Iber, Assistant Professor, University of Wisconsin, Madison

Melani McAlister, Professor of American Studies & International Affairs, George Washington Univ.

Anders Stephanson, Andrew and Virginia Rudd Family Foundation Professor of History, Columbia University

Historians who are not SHAFR members

Simeon Man, Assistant Professor of History, University of California, San Diego

Jason McGraw, Associate Professor of History, Indiana University

Nancy Kwak, Associate Professor, University of California, San Diego

Theresa Ventura, Assistant Professor, Concordia University, Montreal

Herbert Sloan, Professor Emeritus of History, Barnard College, Columbia University

Judy Tzu-Chun Wu, Professor, University of California, Irvine

Diana Martinez, Assistant Professor, Tufts University

Ross Caputi, PhD Student, University of Massachusetts

Nathaniel K Powell, Postdoctoral Researcher, King's College London

Julie Greene, Professor, University of Maryland at College Park

Brent Cebul, Assistant Professor, University of North Carolina, Charlotte

Andrei Mamolea, PhD Candidate, The Graduate Institute, Geneva

Thomas Drake, PhD, Whistleblower, former Senior Executive National Security Agency

Robert Vitalis, Professor of Political Science, University of Pennsylvania

Nikhil Pal Singh, Professor of History, New York University

S. Ani Mukherji, Assistant Professor, Hobart and William Smith Colleges

Andrew Zimmerman, Professor of History, George Washington University

Mark Healey, Associate Professor, University of Connecticut

Matthew Farish, Associate Professor, Geography & Planning, University of Toronto

Victoria de Grazia, Moore Collegiate Professor of History, Columbia University

Vanessa Ogle, Associate Professor, University of California - Berkeley

Pablo Palomino, Assistant Professor, Emory University

Greg Grandin, Professor, New York University

Mary A. Renda, Professor and Chair of History, Mount Holyoke College

Patrick Sharma, Independent Scholar

Linda Nash, Associate Professor of History, University of Washington

Udi Greenberg, Associate Professor, Dartmouth College

Joy Rohde, Assistant Professor, University of Michigan

Jacob Mundy, Associate Professor, Peace & Conflict Studies, Colgate University

Brenda Gayle Plummer, Professor, University of Wisconsin, Madison

Rebecca Herman, Assistant Professor, UC Berkeley

Prakash Kumar, Associate Professor, Pennsylvania State University

Brandon Wolfe-Hunnicutt, Assistant Professor, California State University Stanislaus

Hannah Waits, PhD Candidate, UC Berkeley

Bethany Moreton, Professor, Dartmouth College

Dara Orenstein, Assistant Professor of American Studies, George Washington University

Luis Herran Avila, Visiting Assistant Professor, Carleton College

Gregory Graves, PhD Candidate, George Washington University

Alyosha Goldstein, Associate Professor of American Studies, University of New Mexico

David Sartorius, Associate Professor of History, University of Maryland

Brian Connolly, Associate Professor, University of South Florida

Joanne Meyerowitz, Professor, Yale University

Kevin Coleman, Assistant Professor, University of Toronto

Simon Toner, Lecturer, University of Sheffield

Kevin A. Young, Assistant Professor of History, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Jessica Johnson, History Department Community Engagement Director, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Simeon J. Newman, Doctoral candidate, Sociology, University of Michigan

Daniel S. Chard, Lecturer, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Diana Carolina Sierra Becerra, Lecturer, Smith College

Adam Ewing, Assistant Professor of African American Studies, Virginia Commonwealth University

Barbara Epstein, Professor Emerita, University of California, Santa Cruz

Richard Lachmann, Professor of Sociology, University at Albany- SUNY

Jessica Pliley, Associate Professor, Texas State University

Elizabeth Hutchison, Professor of History, University of New Mexico

Glenda Elizabeth Gilmore, Peter V. & C. Vann Woodward Professor of History, Yale

Manuel Berduc, PhD Student, Cornell University

Larry Nichelson, Educator, San Francisco Unified School Schools

José Juan Pérez Meléndez, University of California, Davis, Assistant Professor

Teresa Meade, Professor, Union College

Jeffrey P. Kimball, Professor Emeritus, Miami University

Brenda Elsey, Associate Professor, History, Hofstra University

Mary Nolan, Professor of History, New York University

Marjorie Lasky, Professor Emerita, Diablo Valley College

Myrna Santiago, Professor, Chair of the History Department, Saint Mary's College of California

Cyrus Bina, Distinguished Research Professor, University of Minnesota

Peter Kuznick, Professor of History, Director Nuclear Studies Institute, American University

Paul J. Croce, Professor, Stetson University

Jacob Remes, Clinical Assistant Professor, Gallatin School of Individualized Study, New York University

Van Gosse, Professor and Chair, Dept. of History, Franklin & Marshall College

David C. Carlson, Ph.D., Archivist, Bexar County Spanish Archives

Lewis H Siegelbaum, Emeritus Professor of History, Michigan State University

Renate Bridenthal, Professor of History, Retired, Brooklyn College, CUNY

Kenneth R. Zimmerman, PhD, President and Chief Research Historian, The History Business

H. Bruce Franklin, John Cotton Dana Professor of English and American Studies, emeritus, Rutgers University, Newark

Robert Buchanan, Faculty, Undergraduate Studies, Goddard College

Gretchen Lemke-Santangelo, Professor, Department of History, Saint Mary's College of California

Devra Anne Weber, Associate Professor, UC Riverside

Glenna Matthews, Independent Scholar

Kenneth Janken, Professor, University of North Carolina

Matthew Evangelista, President White Professor of History and Political Science, Cornell University

Carol Lang, Adjunct Assistant Professor, Bronx Community College

Jeremy Varon, Full Professor - History, The New School

Alon Raab, Lecturer, Retired, UC, Davis

Geoff Eley, Karl Pohrt Distinguished University Professor of Contemporary History, University of Michigan

Richard Gibson, Emeritus Professor, San Diego State University

Henry Schwarz, Professor, Georgetown University

Christopher Lowe, Ph.D. in African History from Yale University, Independent Scholar

Rita Maran, Lecturer International Human Rights Law & Policy, Retired, University of California, Berkeley

Michael Stewart Foley, Professor of American Civilization, Université Grenoble Alpes

Mari Jo Buhle, History Professor Emerita, Brown University

H. Larry Ingle, Professor, Emeritus, University of Tennessee-Chattanooga

Sigrid Schmalzer, Professor, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

Michael Meeropol, Professor Emeritus of Economics, Western New England University

Robyn C. Spencer, Associate Professor of History, Lehman College, CUNY

Robert C.H. Sweeny, Honourary Research Professor of History, Memorial University of Newfoundland

Francis Shor, Professor Emeritus, Wayne State University

Jessie Kindig, Visiting Scholar, New York University

David Hunt, Professor, History Department, UMass/Boston

Jerise Fogel, Instructor, Classics & General Humanities, Montclair State University

Emilye Jean Crosby, Professor, SUNY Geneseo

Jeffrey Ostler, Professor of History, University of Oregon

Ellen Schrecker, Professor of History, Retired, Yeshiva University

Tariq Khan, PhD Candidate, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Carol Quirke, Associate Professor of American Studies, SUNY Old Westbury

Deborah Buffton, Professor of History, University of Wisconsin-La Crosse

Lawrence Wittner, Professor of History Emeritus, SUNY/Albany

Kate Dossett, Associate Professor of U.S. History, University of Leeds

Kimberly Gauderman, Associate Professor, University of New Mexico

John Marciano, Professor Emeritus, SUNY Cortland

Inderjeet Parmar , Professor of International Politics , City University of London

Stephen M. Streeter, Associate Professor of History, McMaster University

A. Tom Grunfeld, SUNY Distinguished Teaching Professor Emeritus, Empire State College/SUNY

Chelsee Boehm, Digital Projects & Oral History Assistant, Weber State University

Daniel Geary, Associate Professor of U.S. History, Trinity College Dublin

David Swanson, Author, World BEYOND War

Steven Schwartzberg, PhD in History of US Foreign Relations, Yale University

Moon-Ho Jung, Associate Professor of History, University of Washington

John Womack, Jr., Robert Woods Bliss Professor of Latin American History and Economics, Emeritus, Harvard University

Steven J. Hirsch, Professor of Practice - International & Area Studies, Washington University

Artemy Kalinovsky, Senior Lecturer, University of Amsterdam

Robert Karl, Assistant Professor of Latin American History, Princeton University

David Stein, Lecturer, UCLA

David Sim, Lecturer in US History, University College London

Paul Buhle, Senior Lecturer, Brown University

Claudia Koonz, Emeritus, Duke History

Martin Halpern, Professor of History Emeritus , Henderson State University

Tami J. Friedman, Associate Professor, Department of History, Brock University, St. Catharines, Ont., Canada

Mark Selden, Professor Emeritus, Sociology and History, State University of New York at Binghamton

Phillip Deery, Emeritus Professor, Victoria University

S.M. Gazanfar, Professor Emeritus, University of Idaho

Barry Trachtenberg, Rubin Presidential Chair of Jewish History, Wake Forest University

Marjorie Murphy, Professor of History, Swarthmore College

Jeffrey S. Brown, Associate Professor, University of New Brunswick (Fredericton)

Barbara Weinstein, Silver Professor of History, New York University

Andrew J. Bacevich, Professor Emeritus of History and International Relations, Boston University

James P. O'Brien, Professor Emeritus of History, University of Massachusetts Boston

Alfred W. McCoy, Harrington Chair in History, University of Wisconsin-Madison