Quote:
Originally Posted by yoopr
Plus the fact that the only people saying there is a "Civil War" is the MSM.
IF you knew anything about Iraq you'd know that if ANYTHING would have caused "Civil War" it was the Bombing of the Mosque in Sammarha.
.....the MSM is sitting on their Balconies at either the Palace in Baghdad or Camp Victory and only reporting Hearsay reports from "Outside the Wire"
Actually the bombing of the mosque WAS about the time most experts began admitting we were "stuck" in the middle of a Civil War in Iraq.
For SOME reason YOU think that only MSM pundits are speaking out on this. Here is part of a report from
March '05, where those speaking are NOT from the media. Since this report, MANY more have spoken out from Generals to Ambassadors and others.
Quote:
"It's just political rhetoric to say we are not in a civil war. We've been in a civil war for a long time," said Pat Lang, the former top Middle East intelligence official at the Pentagon.
Other experts said Iraq is on the verge of a full-scale civil war with civilians on both sides being slaughtered. Incidents in the past two weeks south of Baghdad, with apparently retaliatory killings of Sunni and Shia civilians, point in that direction, they say.
Also of concern were media accounts that hard-line Shia militia members are being deployed to police hard-line Sunni communities such as Ramadi, east of Baghdad, which specialists on Iraq said was a recipe for disaster.
"I think we are really on the edge" of all-out civil war, said Noah Feldman, a New York University law professor who worked for the U.S. coalition in Iraq.
He said the insurgency has been "getting stronger every passing day. When the violence recedes, it is a sign that they are regrouping." While there is a chance the current flare of violence is the insurgency's last gasp, he said, "I have not seen any coherent evidence that we are winning against the insurgency." [this was over a year ago!]
"Everything we thought we knew about the insurgency obviously is flawed," said Judith Kipper of the Council on Foreign Relations. "It was quiet for a little while, and here it is back full force all over the country, and that is very dark news."
The increased violence coincides with the approval of a new, democratic government two weeks ago. But instead of bringing the country together, the new government seems to have further alienated even moderate Sunnis who believe they have only token representation.
"That is a joke," said Sunni politician Saad Jabouri, until recently governor of Diyala Province, in an interview here. "The only people they allowed in the government are ones who think like them," he said of the majority Shia faction, who mostly come from Islamic parties.
Military and civilian experts said the insurgency seemed designed to outlast the patience of the American and Iraqi peoples.
"I just think this Sunni thing is going to be pretty hard," said Phebe Marr, a leading U.S. Iraq expert reached in the protected Green Zone in Baghdad. "The American public has to get its expectations down to something reasonable."
Lang said there is new evidence that Saddam Hussein's regime carefully prepared in advance for the insurgency, with former Iraqi officers at the core of each group. They are well coordinated and have consistently adjusted their strategy, he said.
Now the 140,000-plus U.S. troops in the country are mainly "a nuisance" factor in the insurgents' overall goal of preventing the new government from consolidating.
"They understand what the deal is here," Lang said, "to start applying maximum pressure to the economy and the government and make sure it will not work." Their roadside bombs are intended to keep U.S. forces inside their bases, he said.
All the while the insurgents are gaining strength, he said. "The longer they keep going on the better they will get," said Lang, a student of military history. "The best school of war is war."
The Sunni insurgents could win the battle if they persevere long enough to sour U.S. voters, Feldman said.
He said, "There is no evidence whatsoever that they cannot win."