Thus Spake God's Creator; (I don't forgive *****!)
OFFICERS: *Military can't end insurgency*
The solution in Iraq will have to come through the political process,
Americans there agree.
By Tom Lasseter
Inquirer Foreign Staff
BAGHDAD - A growing number of senior American military officers in Iraq have
concluded there is no long-term military solution to an insurgency that has
killed thousands of Iraqis and more than 1,300 U.S. troops in the last two years.
Instead, officers say, the only way to end the guerrilla war is through Iraqi
politics - an arena that has been crippled by divisions between Shiite
Muslims, whose coalition dominated January elections, and Sunni Muslims, who
are a minority in Iraq and form the base of support for the insurgency.
"I think the more accurate way to approach this right now is to concede
that... this insurgency is not going to be settled, the terrorists and the
terrorism in Iraq is not going to be settled, through military options or
military operations," Brig. Gen. Donald Alston, the chief U.S. military
spokesman in Iraq, said last week, echoing other senior officers. "It's going
to be settled in the political process."
Gen. George W. Casey, the U.S. commander in Iraq, called the military's
efforts "the Pillsbury Doughboy idea" - pressing the insurgency in one area
only causes it to rise elsewhere.
"Like in Baghdad," Casey said last week. "We push in Baghdad - they're down to
about less than a car bomb a day in Baghdad over the last week - but in
north-center [Iraq]... they've gone up. The political process will be the
decisive element."
The recognition that a military solution is not in the offing has led U.S. and
Iraqi officials to signal they are willing to negotiate with insurgent groups
or their intermediaries.
"It has evolved in the course of normal business," said a senior U.S.
diplomatic official in Baghdad, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of
U.S. policy to defer to the Iraqi government on political matters. "We have
now encountered people who at least claim to have some form of a relationship
with the insurgency."
The message is markedly different from statements by U.S. officials who spoke
of quashing the insurgency by rounding up or killing "dead-enders" loyal to
former dictator Saddam Hussein. As recently as two weeks ago, in a Memorial
Day interview on CNN's Larry King Live, Vice President Cheney said he believed
the insurgency was in its "last throes."
But the violence has continued unabated, even though 44 of the 55 leaders of
the Hussein regime portrayed in the U.S. military's famous "deck of cards"
have been killed or captured, including Hussein.
Lt. Col. Frederick P. Wellman, who works with the task force overseeing
training of Iraqi security troops, said the insurgency did not seem to be
running out of recruits, a dynamic fueled by tribal members seeking revenge
for relatives killed in fighting.
"We can't kill them all," Wellman said. "When I kill one, I create three."
Last month was one of the deadliest since President Bush declared the end of
major combat operations in May 2003, a month that saw six U.S. troops killed
by hostile fire. In May 2005, 67 U.S. troops were killed by hostile fire, the
fourth-highest tally since the war began, according to Iraq Coalition Casualty
Count, an Internet site that uses official casualty reports to organize deaths
by a variety of criteria.
At least 26 troops have been killed by insurgents this month, bringing to
1,311 the number of U.S. soldiers killed by hostile action. Accidents or
illness claimed 391 more service members' lives.
Iraqi Interior Minister Bayan Jabr said last week that the insurgency had
killed 12,000 Iraqis during the last two years. He did not say how he arrived
at the figure.
U.S. officials had hoped January's national elections would blunt the
insurgency by giving all Iraqis hope for their political future. But the
political process has not in any meaningful way included Iraq's Sunni Muslim
population.
Most of Iraq's Sunnis, motivated either by fear or boycott, did not vote, and
they hold a scant 17 seats in the 275-member National Assembly, which is
charged with writing a constitution.
With Shiites and Kurds stocking the nation's security forces with members of
their militias, Sunnis have been marginalized and, according to some analysts
in Iraq, have become more willing to join armed groups.
Since September, about 85 percent of the violence in Iraq has occurred in just
four of Iraq's 18 provinces: the Sunni heartland of Baghdad, Anbar, Nineveh
and Salah ad-Din.
Sunnis near downtown Baghdad have only to drive down the street to see how
precarious their position in Iraqi politics and society is these days. Near
the party headquarters for the Shiite Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution
in Iraq, which is in large part shaping the policy of the nation, Kurdish
militia members patrol the streets.
The troops are ostensibly part of the nation's army, but they still wear
militia uniforms and, as is the case with some in Kurdistan, many either can't
or won't speak Arabic. One of the roads they patrol has been named Badr
Street, for the armed wing of the Supreme Council. There is a large billboard
with the looming face of Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the Supreme Council's leader.
Unless Sunnis develop confidence that the government will represent them, few
here see the insurgency fading.
In speaking of success in suppressing the insurgency in Baghdad - the result
of large-scale raids that targeted primarily Sunni neighborhoods - Brig. Gen.
Alston said he expected the violence to return.
"We have made good progress" in stopping the production of car bombs in
Baghdad, Alston said. "Now, do I think that there will be more [bombs] in
Baghdad? Yes, I do."
GOD'S CREATOR
...That was my only sin... :-(
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Wise men face the unknown, and boldly looks for reality!
Others... fall on their hands and knees, and start mumbling...
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