Quote:
Originally posted by Rolo@Jun 28 2005, 06:15 PM
Its still winnable - there is political progress in Iraq with a new constitution in August/September, but ofcourse there is no guarantee that it will get broad support. However every time a new major political turn point is there, then its possible to make compromises, which played correctly, will divide the opposition into smaller and smaller groups - its call democracy, and its seldom pretty in the beginning (just think of the wars and revolutions we have seen in the western world).
Yes, Bush missed alot of things when dealing with Iraq after the war, however the recent change in tone might be the start of a more flexible strategy. Bush will be in Europe next week for the G-8 meeting, and later that week he will visit and have talks with some of the european allies who have trops in Iraq....
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Seems to me that somebody needs tuning up - Cheney and Rummy are playing the same song in very different keys right now. Maybe you can be Mr. Mary Sunshine and read hope into the recent change of tone - me, I think they've struck more cords than a third-rate drunken jazz pianist on heroin trying to improvise.
The major difference between Yugoslavia ten-twelve years ago and Iraq today that I see is that the ethnic tensions in Yugoslavia were simmering under the surface, whereas in Iraq they are very close to blowing up in the streets (if they aren't already).
The structures we are attempting to build in Iraq today won't be strong enough to withstand a serious attack on it without our physical presence for one hell of a lot longer than the American people are going to be willing to committ.
One of the reasons for that is the constantly changing tone. They've put out more fucking reasons for this war than Johnson and Nixon combined did for the Vietnam war. You can fool some of 'em some of the time, but you can't fool all of 'em this fucking long.