Word: iraqi
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...Iraq. We could drive out every last Islamic extremist, and the country would still be in the midst of a civil war that is trending toward chaos. And make no mistake: the U.S. colonialist insistence on dictating the shape of Iraq's future - framing a constitution, training an Iraqi army and the threat of a permanent U.S. military presence - has exacerbated the chaos...
...Ryan Crocker told me, "The fall of the Maliki government, when it happens, might be a good thing." But replace it with what? The consensus in the U.S. intelligence community is that there's going to be lots of bloodshed, including fighting among the Shi'ites, before a credible Iraqi government emerges. It also seems that the U.S. attempt to build an Iraqi army and police force has been a failure. Some units are pretty good, but most are unreliable, laced with members of various Shi'ite militias. This was clear from my conversations with U.S. combat officers...
...next leader of Iraq and the shape of the next Iraqi government and its armed forces will probably be determined by how the Sadr-Hakim battle turns out, as will the decision about how or whether to reconcile with the Sunnis. The Kurds will prefer the aristocratic Hakims to the populist Sadrs, and so will we. But aristocrats seldom win battles of this sort; a strongman who is no fan of democracy or the West might emerge. In any case, the choice will be made by the Iraqis...
...Ministry of Fearmore than anything else, counterterrorism experts interviewed by TIME cited Giuliani's campaign rhetoric as a cause for concern. He frequently conflates different threats, from Iraqi insurgents to al-Qaeda to Iran, into one monolithic dark force. He routinely compares the terrorism threat to the Holocaust and the cold war. In one 15-min. phone interview in August, Giuliani compared the terrorism threat with Nazism or communism six times. When I asked him if he risked exaggerating the threat, since most terrorist plots against the West are not the kind of attacks that will bring down a nation...
...says, is a sign that Iraq's leaders are committed to working together to find solutions that may yield some political advances ahead of the September progress report he and top Iraq commander Gen. David Petraeus are to deliver in Washington. "We do expect results, as do the Iraqi people," said Crocker. Expectations in Iraq, however, have a four-year history now of turning into disappointments...