Which foreign language will be most valuable in the next 20 years?

[MikeF]

I believe that Iran will re-emerge as the enduring Middle Eastern nation, hopefully as a strong US Ally. If this student is more interested in shaping our future than our past, I would recommend Farsi.

Schmedlap, COL Jones stated it better than I could. I'm choosing Farsi with Arabic as a close second.

Others have made strong inference that many have already picked up english as a second language-at least verbally.

v/r

Mike

[Schmedlap]

My only reservation on Farsi would be to wonder how much we're actually going to communicate with Iran. I can foresee them behaving more like North Korea than Libya. But, I suppose it depends on how one intends to function - on the ground in a country and interacting face-to-face or in a more removed capacity and/or as a diplomat. If one intends to read foreign news, watch foreign TV, and other analysis type work, then Farsi would seem the way to go, as this does not require cordial relations with the country. If one intends to travel to a foreign country to do diplomatic work or conventional military work (I suspect that we'll have tens of thousands of troops in Iraq for quite a while), then Arabic.

But, either way, I do agree that Arabic and Farsi are probably the two best guesses. Whether to choose one over the other depends upon how one intends to use the skill. One could argue for one over the other for quite a while... or just learn both.