Calling a Spade a Spade (Iraq's civil war)

[ProSense]

Calling a Spade a Spade

If it looks, feels and sounds like one, why won't Iraqi or U.S. politicians call what's unfolding in Iraq a 'civil war'?

WEB EXCLUSIVE
By Scott Johnson
Newsweek

Updated: 7:53 p.m. ET July 29, 2006

July 29, 2006 - The killing spree in the Baghdad neighborhood Hai Al Jihad began in the darkness and continued into the morning of July 9, when marauding gangs of militiamen began systematically separating Shia from Sunnis, and killing the Sunnis on sight. "We found dead bodies in our neighborhood which means that the gangs started killing during the night," says one woman who witnessed much of the killing, "In the morning, they put a checkpoint near the entrance to the neighborhood and started asking for ID's; any Sunni was killed immediately. They stopped private cars and buses, the Shiites were asked to go and Sunnis were killed. The gangs also raided houses and shouted at the people there, 'You pimps, Sunnis, we will kill you. And they did.'"

Then, last Thursday, on a day like so many in Baghdad, two mortars and a car bomb ripped through an apartment building and crowded marketplace in Kerrada, a largely Shia neighborhood, killing 32 and wounding 150 more. Enraged residents screamed, spitting and shoving at the Iraqi police who, as is so often the case, had failed to prevent the attack. So it goes in Iraq: car bomb, death squad raid, suicide bomb, rocket attack—the litany of sectarian violence has become so familiar and so gruesome that often the most egregious acts of Iraqi bloodshed barely merit more than two lines at the bottom of a wire service story. Americans have been dulled into apathy, if not near total incomprehension, by the scope of the brutality.

And yet the question persists: Is Iraq in a civil war? And if so, how, exactly, do you measure a civil war?

Iraqis have never before in their modern history been embroiled in a civil war. If they believe they are in the midst of one now, why shouldn't the rest of us believe them? Across the country, Shiites and Sunnis have abandoned what for decades have been mixed neighborhoods and retreated into ethnically pure enclaves. They are protected by militias like Muqtada Sadr's Mehdi Army whose very claim to legitimacy can be found in its pledge to protect the believers of the "true faith" against the apostates of the other group. Shiites and Sunnis have had grievances dating back over 1,400 years. But in Iraq, Saddam Hussein buried those grievances in his death grip on society. The last three years of mounting violence, however, have served as a slow release valve allowing those feelings of injustice, and the accompanying desire for revenge, to resurface with full force.

Snip...

By most benchmarks, as one well-briefed Western analyst in Baghdad tells me, Iraq slipped into civil war "a long time ago." Some observers insist that the scope of the violence hasn't reached critical levels yet. U.S. and military officials in Baghdad admit that "tit for tat killings" are occurring, but on a limited scale. But what is "limited" about an estimated 6,000 civilians killed in May and June alone, according to a recent U.N. report on Iraq's violence? Or that some 27,000 Iraqi families had registered for relocation since February, according to reports from the Ministry of Displacement and Migration?

more...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14096471/site/newsweek

[HysteryDiagnosis]

1. Can we liken this to what happened in certain S. American

countries after we democratized them as well?? One must come to the painfully obvious and inevitable conclusion... but remember, they hate us for our freedom.

www.soaw.org

[Botany]

2. But in April of 2003

* 4/2003 military resistance is virtually ended; Iraq has been liberated

Today, organized military resistance is virtually ended; the major cities of Iraq have been liberated. (Applause.)




Thanks to the courage and the might of our military, the American people are more secure. Thanks to the courage and might of our military, the Iraqi people are now free.

One week ago, Baghdad was filled with statues and giant pictures of the dictator. They're kind of hard to find today. (Laughter.) The fall of that statue in Baghdad marked the end of a nightmare for the Iraqi people, and it marked the start of a new day of freedom. (Applause.)

American and coalition forces still face serious risks in Iraq. Scattered enemy is still capable of doing harm to our forces and to the innocent. But we'll stay focused. We will finish what we've begun. We will press on until our mission is finished and victory is complete. (Applause.)

On September the 11th, 2001, America found that we are not immune to the threats that gather for years across the ocean; threats that can arrive in sudden tragedy. Since September the 11th, we've been engaged in a global war against terror, a war being waged on many fronts. That war continues, and we are winning. (Applause.)

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.white ...

[babylonsister]

3. Nom. This admin won't own up to any 'mistakes' regardless of

the blood that's continually dripping.

[ProSense]

4. Can Iraq be Fixed?

Can Iraq be Fixed?

Politicians dance around this question, but here's the reality: It will take U.S. troops years of work, and success is hardly a sure bet

By Kevin Whitelaw and Anna Mulrine

Posted Sunday, July 30, 2006

July was supposed to have been, at long last, a good month for the U.S. effort in Iraq. A new unity government was fully formed and at work. The feared terrorist Abu Musab Zarqawi was dead. And U.S. and Iraqi officials had launched a new security plan to stanch the bloodshed in Baghdad. It hasn't quite worked out that way. Rather, Baghdad in July has been wilder and more dangerous than ever, engulfed by a wave of targeted assassinations, reprisal attacks, and mass kidnappings. When Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki visited Washington last week, the air was not celebratory but instead one of crisis. The primary outcome: a decision to increase the number of U.S. troops in Baghdad.

Snip...

In addition to requesting more trainers, U.S. defense officials have for months been privately lobbying for better equipment for the Iraqi Army. "Clearly, we can't withdraw from Iraq unless Iraqi security forces have a clear-cut advantage over the forces they're dealing with," says McCaffrey, who has called for more light armored vehicles, mortars, artillery, and air support capabilities for Iraq's military. But some military officials express grave concern about what would happen to U.S.-provided equipment should Iraqi security further degenerate. "It's the question of the century: How much of our technology to give them, considering the possibility that the country could degenerate into civil war," says one Army Forces Central Command official. "How much ends up six years down the road in Iran? What if we give them all new technology, and they use it against each other? What capabilities should we give them?"

Snip...

The American military trainers worry, too, about the Iraqis' dependence on them. Lt. Gen Martin Dempsey, in charge of training Iraqi security forces, uses the analogy of the teeter-totter. "On the one side is the ability of our Iraqi counterparts to absorb what they need to, and on the other side is the danger that they will become dependent on us," he tells U.S. News. "My job is to look at every aspect of this mission of training and determine when is the right time to transition control over to the Iraqi side. If I do it too soon, it tips, and if I do it too late, they become so comfortable and dependent--it's literally too difficult to encourage their capacity for them."

Snip...

It is not clear how long Iraqis will wait. "They haven't polarized to the degree that everybody feels that the only way out is through fighting," says Dana Eyre, a senior fellow at the U.S. Institute of Peace who served as a U.S. adviser in Iraq. "It's like Thelma and Louise heading toward the cliff. We can see the edge, but we haven't gone over it yet."

http://www.usnews.com/usnews/news/articles/060730/7iraq.htm

No matter how many opinions people offer up about the war, the above points represent the quagmire that makes it clear that the U.S. needs to issue an ultimatum to the Iraqi government by setting a date for withdrawal. The U.S. can do nothing about Iraq's civil war, and it's now evident that Iraq is aligning itself with Iran. Looking at the series of question in the second paragraph above: How exaxtly does a prolonged stay in Iraq provide answers?