News & Politics - U.S. Lowers Sights On What Can Be Achieved in Iraq

TokyoNiGHTS · 08-14-2005, 07:22 AM

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The Bush administration is significantly lowering expectations of what can be achieved in Iraq, recognizing that the United States will have to settle for far less progress than originally envisioned during the transition due to end in four months, according to U.S. officials in Washington and Baghdad.

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The United States no longer expects to see a model new democracy, a self-supporting oil industry or a society in which the majority of people are free from serious security or economic challenges, U.S. officials say.

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"The most thoroughly dashed expectation was the ability to build a robust self-sustaining economy. We're nowhere near that. State industries, electricity are all below what they were before we got there," said Wayne White, former head of the State Department's Iraq intelligence team who is now at the Middle East Institute. "The administration says Saddam ran down the country. But most damage was from looting [after the invasion], which took down state industries, large private manufacturing, the national electric" system.

Ironically, White said, the initial ambitions may have complicated the U.S. mission: "In order to get out earlier, expectations are going to have to be lower, even much lower. The higher your expectation, the longer you have to stay. Getting out is going to be a more important consideration than the original goals were. They were unrealistic."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...081300853.html

The big negative is that they couldn't stop being so jumpy to get into this war and look at the bigger picture and see that it wasn't possible to do what they wanted before this started.

In Fair Verona · 08-14-2005, 06:00 PM

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The United States no longer expects to see a model new democracy, a self-supporting oil industry or a society in which the majority of people are free from serious security or economic challenges, U.S. officials say.

Well what I want to know is what they do expect now if not that. I think the people of Iraq would like to know what they're in for as well.

ceilirose · 08-15-2005, 02:59 AM

What's interesting is the part of the article which states that consideration will be given to Islam laws and that women probably won't have equal rights. I remember some of us mentioning that those situations could happen in a new Iraq and being told how wrong that was, the newly freed Iraqi people would never let that happen, etc., etc.

Sort of a slap in the face (to put it mildly) for the female soldiers who have given their lives in this mess.

Lexis · 08-15-2005, 07:00 AM

Don't get me started - I'm just so frustrated and angry that we could very well leave Iraq's women with worse laws than they had under Saddam. If Bush's chatter about freedom wasn't a joke before, the introduction of discriminatory sharia laws will make it clear.

alli balli · 08-15-2005, 08:24 AM

Yeah...from the very beginning my dad kept saying this was what would happen. Looks like he was right. "What up, Iraq! Sorry we destroyed your electric system and industrial properties, and killed a bunch of people, but as a parting gift we're going to leave you a theocracy. Enjoy."

Our country is run by such lying assh-les.

Milt Palacio · 08-15-2005, 06:20 PM

Yes, it looks like Iraq will be another fascist theocracy where the women are just as oppressed.

We should probably just leave once their constitution is written and let them sort out the mess. It's not going to end well.

ceilirose · 08-22-2005, 10:02 AM

I don't know if this is what Bush & his neo-con buddies thought would happen but it looks more and more like Iraq will become a theocracy.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...200101_pf.html

Quote:

Draft Constitution Would Fundamentally Change Iraq
Sunni Demands Rejected, Making it Unlikely They Will Accept Charter

By Ellen Knickmeyer and Jonathan Finer
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, August 22, 2005; 10:42 AM

BAGHDAD, Aug. 22 -- Shiites and Kurds were sending a draft constitution to parliament on Monday that would fundamentally change Iraq, transforming the country into a loose federation, with a weak central administration governed by Islamic law, negotiators said.

The draft, slated for action by a Monday deadline, would be a sweeping rejection of the demands of Iraq's disaffected Sunni minority, which has called the proposed federal system the start of the breakup of Iraq. Shiites and Kurds indicated they were in no mood to compromise.

"We gave a choice -- whoever doesn't want federalism can opt not to practice it," said Shiite constitutional committee member Ali Debagh. Debagh acknowledged the Sunni minority would be unlikely to accept such a draft in a national vote scheduled for October, saying, "We depended upon democracy in writing the constitution and will depend upon it in the referendum."

Sunnis, who had complained of being shut out of talks in recent days, said they still were negotiating. "I don't think there will be a constitution tonight," said Salih Mutlak, the most vocal Sunni moderator.

Another Sunni delegate, Sadoun Zubaidi, angrily asked, "What about the principle of consensus? The principle of consensus is a fundamental, basic to the whole process. If you abandon the principle of consensus, you abandon the basis on which you're forming the constitution. We insist on being part of the process."

Shiites and Kurdish negotiators said the latest draft would be the one submitted to the National Assembly.

U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad kept up days of pressure on negotiators to complete the constitution, giving his sanction to the provisions on Islamic law, negotiators said.

Washington has been pushing hard to stick to a timeline on government-building that would allow for a significant troop withdrawal as soon as early next spring.

Key provisions of the draft would formalize an already autonomous Kurdish state in the north, under a federal system. The rest of the country also would be allowed to form federal systems -- opening the way for the demand by the dominant Shiite Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq to create a southern Shiite sub-state out of up to half of Iraq's 18 regions.

Sunnis and others say such a state would be under heavy influence from neighboring, Shiite-ruled Iran.

The draft also stipulates that Iraq is an Islamic state and that no law can contradict the principles of Islam, Shiite and Kurdish negotiators said. Opponents have charged that last provision would subject Iraqis to religious edicts by individual clerics.

The Shiite and Kurdish negotiators also said draft calls for the presence of Islamic clerics on the court that would interpret the constitution. Family matters such as divorce, marriage or inheritance would be decided either by religious law or civil law as an individual chooses -- a condition that opponents say would likely lead to women being forced into unfavorable rulings for them by opponents demanding judgments under Islamic law.

It remained uncertain Monday how the National Assembly would treat such a draft. Those opposed to the constitution would have to muster "no" votes by at least two-thirds of the eligible voters in three provinces to defeat it.

4est · 08-23-2005, 06:37 AM

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Originally Posted by ceilirose

I don't know if this is what Bush & his neo-con buddies thought would happen but it looks more and more like Iraq will become a theocracy.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...200101_pf.html

I'm just not sure of anything anymore with this war. At the beginning, I backed the president, based on the 'intelligence' at the time. Now, I'm so skeptical that it almost appears to me that the whole thing was for the purpose of removing Saddam.
If that is the case, it may have all backfired. I'm almost to the point now that I believe Saddam may have been the lesser of two evils. What's worse? A despot dictator? Or a theocratic regime run by Muslims, who by nature abhor non-Muslims. Or even other Muslim sects?

~Gump


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