Tony Cordesman, one of the most level-headed of the national security analysts on Iraq, has issued a paper called "Options for Iraq: The Almost Good, the Bad, and the Ugly." In it he writes:
Iraq is already in a serious civil war, driven by rising sectarian and ethnic violence between Arab Sunni and Arab Shi’ite, and Arab and Kurd. Iraq’s government is not moving towards political conciliation and compromise at the rate necessary to keep this civil war from getting worse, discrediting the central government, and potentially dividing the country. ...The US cannot simply wait to see if its existing strategy and actions will work. They will not. The situation is spiraling out of control, and the US must either strongly reinforce its existing strategy or change it. It also needs detailed plans and options for “Plan B,” the possibility that it may have to withdraw its troops and possibly most or all of its civilian presence from Iraq.
This is important. And we'll be hearing more and more about this after the November election.
Comments (2)
If Iraq is divided into three states- Iran will splinter.
Posted by kevin | October 12, 2006 2:24 AM
Posted on October 12, 2006 02:24
With all the talk about pulling u.s. troops out of iraq..we're forgetting two of the major concerns of the Bush White House--how pull out the troops but still maintain U.S.sway over Iraq's vast petroleum reserves, and how preserve the mammoth new bases that the u.s. has also built in Iraq over the past couple of years for hundreds of millions of dollars. Those bases were destined to give the u.s. a strategic hold not over Iraq but the entire region...
Now, there's an interesting problem
For more, please see my blog: http://barrylando.com/?cat=2
Posted by barry lando | October 13, 2006 9:17 AM
Posted on October 13, 2006 09:17