jorgelito

Don't forget, the people have been fighting back. Locals (shopkeepers etc) got sick and tired of the chaos and instability caused by the "bad apples" (not all Iraqis are bad) and fought back. Does anyone remember a few weeks back, when these shopkeepers sucessfully fought off a bunch of "insurgents"? I think there was a thread on that somwhere around here.

I think the majority of Iraqis just want to have the water running, the power on, schools to go to, open their stores and stay open without fear of insurgent activity, and the resulting "lockdown" and "sweeps" by US troops. IMO, both have bad results.

The key is stablizing the damn place. We need more troops and committment to actually "fixing" the place instead of this dragging of feet and passing the buck. Putting an inexperienced, untrained local police and armed forces out in the field is disastrous. (this would follow your "right or wrong, we made the mess, we have to clean it up" which I agree with).

Anyways, people are tired of having their schools, shops, what-have-you blown up by the insurgents and fed up with the shakedown by US troops.

A veteran from Iraq came to our school last week and gave a powerpoint presentation in our class. He said the reason why schools etc were being targeted was because they were built by coalition (mostly US) troops, contracters etc. So it's like a bad cycle. If anyone's interested, we can open up another thread and I can share with you what this guy talked about. On a side note, the Syrian Ambassador came to speak to our class a few days ago. Very interesting stuff he had to say. We can open a thread on that too. The Israeli Foreign Minister is supposed to come next week. /end tangent

Also, even our good intentions, which some Iraqis no doubt "appreciate" to a certain extent, would still prefer all the foreign elements (not just Western" leave their country. Iraq has had a bad history of foreign occupations and meddling since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and the British Mandate. You can't really blame them for not trusting us. But on the other hand, they (some) want us there as a stabilizing presence (which makes sense too). Makes for a tense and uneasy situation.

Best solution (which I belive we're trying to do), stabilize the place, get their institutions and security apparatus in place and get the hell out ASAP (easier said than done of course).

For those who are interested. Read:

"Threatening Storm", Kenneth Pollack - ex-deputy CIA Director who advised about the Iraq invasion of Kuwait. He provides excellent background about the region and great analysis. This guy has degrees from MIT and Harvard and is currently at the Brookings Institute (I think) or is it the Saban center for Near East Studies.

"Inventing Iraq" - Toby Dodge - explains alot of the British experience and consequences. Lends insight to the fractious state of Iraq. It also talks about the whole Islamic state versus tribal loyalty thing too.

"U.S. Policy in Post-Saddam Iraq: Lessons from the British Experience" - Michale Eisenstadt & Eric Mathewson - This book is awesome. It is pretty short but it is a collection of papers focusing on comparing/contrasting the current US experience in Iraq with the British.

All these books were written by people of high credentials: academics, think-tanks, military and the like. I highly suggest reading these. They are written in a user friendly format. Most of these people have first hand experience in what went on/goes on in makiing the decisions and stuff regarding Iraq.