There is no official draft but, whatever the reason his nephew joined, it is obvious the Uncle wasn’t too happy about it.  The propaganda machine in the US is alive and paid for by tax-paying citizens. Ever been to the movies lately?  The military has very long and well produced advertisements that are geared to psych out young people to join. I always look away, and plug in my ipod, in disgust of what they are displaying on the screen until the advertisement is over. I pay $10 per person to have to watch and listen to this stuff?

Three recent developments in Iraq are noteworthy.
1. U.S. success in arming 70,000 Arab Sunnis, named “Awakening” units, to stop shooting at U.S. soldiers and to fight Al-Qaeda.
2. The cease-fire in August 2007 that Muqtada Al-Sadr ordered the Mahdi army militia to observe for six months, later extended until further notice.
3. NIE report of November 2007, which found with “high confidence” that Iran had halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and has not restarted it. This NIE conclusion reversed the findings of a similar NIE report in 2005.
How is one to read these events?
Today, Washington is happy; U.S. casualties dropped enough to hastily declare success. Tehran is happy; the threat of a U.S. attack has receded. Iraq’s Arab Sunnis are optimistic; the “federalism” clauses in Iraq’s constitution might be amended and de-baathification reversed.
Al-Maliki government is uneasy. Its defense minister stated on December 22, 2007: “Iraq will not allow US-backed neighborhood patrols to become a ‘third force’ alongside police and the army.”
If the Iraqi government acquiesces to Sunni demands, Shii/Sunni reconciliation would follow. If it rejects them, the sectarian violence would return.
On the long-term, the prospects for maintaining the calm are dim. Tehran and Washington are in conflict over who would control GCC oil. Washington, being 10,000 kilometers away relies on military bases to support tribal Arab rulers. Iran is next door.
Iran has become the region’s major power, thanks to U.S. destruction of the Wahhabi Talibans and Saddam’s regime.
Iran has superseded the U.S. as the most influential power in Iraq (Chatham House report, August 2006). Most of Iraq’s 15-million Shiis live Southern Iraq. Shiism’s holiest shrines are there. The prominent families of Najaf and Karbala trace their roots to long lines of marriages with the leading clerics families of Iran. Ayatollahs have cross-country followings. From Najaf and Karbala, Iranian clerics often led the Shii world.
Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani is obeyed by millions in Iraq and Iran. Born and in Mashhad, Iran, he would not accept Iraqi citizenship. Through his disciples, he has been heavily involved in the American designs on Iraq. While consolidating Shii control, Al-Sistani has refrained from fighting the occupation.
Abdulaziz Al-Hakeem is the head of SCIRI and the Badr Brigade. Badr is a militia of thousands; created and sustained by Iran. Al-Hakeem spent most of his adult life in Iran. He is the leader of the largest Parliamentary bloc. When his older brother was assassinated in August 2003, Tehran declared three days of mourning.
Al-Sistani and Al-Hakeem may be described as Tehran’s instruments to institute clerics’ control over Iraq.
Muqtada Al-Sadr may be described as Tehran’s instrument to remove U.S. forces from Iraq. His father and uncle were Grand Ayatollahs. His uncle founded in 1958 the Islamic Daawa Party (IDP). IDP received big support from Tehran. Its leader, Ibrahim Al-Jaafari, was Iraq’s transitional prime minister. Al-Jaafari lived for years in Iran. Nouri Al-Maliki, IDP’s second in command, became Iraq’s first full-term prime minister. Al-Maliki spent two decades in Iran and Syria.
The two parliamentary elections in 2005 handed Iraq’s 60% Shii majority governmental power and with it a central role for Tehran.
The Shiis in Arab lands look to Iran for deliverance from Sunni subjugation. To Sunnis, the Shiis are heretics. President Mubarak declared recently that, Shiis in Arab states were more loyal to Iran than to their own countries.
The notion that Iran might encourage GCC Shiis, who all live in the oil areas, to demand their human rights sends shivers in GCC circles.
Thus, the recent lull in American casualties could be temporary. It’ll end once Washington annoys Tehran.

Elie Elhadj; author: The Islamic Shield
http://www.universal-publishers.com/book.php?method=ISBN&book=1599424118
Also:
http://journals.aol.com/eeh100/daring-opinion/

Hokay.  How long do we put up with this pretense.  The 9/11 coverup is the major crime in the US celebrated ignorant citizens’ history.  Either we accept this, or instead we push for facts.

Due to his experiences as a United Nations Inspector for Weapons of Mass Destruction in Saddam-Iraq,Mr.Scott
Ritter has developed a profound understanding of the
Iraqi political structures and demographic mosaic.

His analytical paragon of current Iraq is difficult to match.In fact,his analysis of “Five Iraqs” is absolutely brilliant.It is one of the best,if not the best,political analysis I have ever read,so far,about present-day-Iraq.
Furthermore,he really hit the jackpot when he made
the following statements on page (2):

Quote
=====
For my money,I choose working with Sunnis and Al-Sadr
to create a viable coalition,and then cutting a deal with Iran that trades off better relations in exchange for encouraging the current failed Iraqi
government to step aside in favor of new election.
And the Kurds? Autonomy or nothing.

Unquote
=======

The choice of Mr. Ritter has not come from a vacuum.
It is not whimsical or capricious.It has come from
a profound knowledge and critical understanding of
the real political undercurrents which will eventually prevail in Iraq.Yes,sir,I am referring to
the undercurrents whose credentials are not tainted by American imperialism or the Iranian domineering
theocracy.The Iraqi People know all of that.Just give
them a chance-a clean chance-to score.

Thank you,Mr.Scott Ritter,for a superb article and
an outstanding analysis.A job well done,indeed.
Sincerely,
Nabih Ammari
An Independent in Ohio.

It is a very good assessment by Ritter of the situation in Iraq. The US committed a grave mistake from the beginning when it imposed a Sectarian Political Process on Iraq based on the faulty Iranian and Zionist instigated so called “20-80%”solution.This Sectarian policy claimed that 80% of the population was 60% Shiite,20% Kurd, and only 20% Sunni. It claimed that the Sunni “minority” ruled dictatorially the poor Shiites and Kurds for the past 80 years and thus should be marginalized and ignored completely. This policy was imposed on Iraq through a Sectarian Constitution, and imposition of Iranian bred clergy and politicians on the political system. It led to the destruction of Iraq, and its social fabric, the squandering of more than 150 billion of its revenues. The killing of 1,200,000 civilians, and according to the UN and the Iraqi government, the displacement of 4.5 million Iraqis (2.5 million of to Syria and Jordan), and 5 million orphaned children, the abrogation of all Woman’s Rights, etc etc .The facts are:
By Nationality
- 83 % of Iraq’s population is Arabs.
-17 % are Kurds, Turkumen, and Assyrians etc.(95 % of Kurds and Turkmen are Sunni)
By Religion and Sec:
-97 % Moslem
-3 % Christian and others.
Moslems:
-  60 - 62 % Sunni , (42 % Arab Sunni, 18 – 20 % Kurd and Turkmen Sunni)
-  38 – 40 % Shiite
I refer all readers to the statistics of the official Independent Iraqi Electoral Commission (appointed by the CPA and Ambassador Bremer) Report which announced the Election results (approved by the Shiite government) which clearly show that the Shiites are the minority in Iraq as follows:
The January 31, 2005 National Assembly Results;
Eligible voters:        15,450,000
Votes for Shiite Slate:  4,075,295   26.3 % of eligible voters (although it was a unified Shiite slate, supported by all Shiite Clergy, Iran, and the US, and statements that 90% of Shiites voting).
The December 15, 2005 Parliament Elections:
Eligible Voters:        15,568,702
Votes for Shiite Slate:  5,021,137   32.2% of eligible voters (again with the same support, and rigged elections supervised by the Shiite government. the results were delayed for two months because of allegations of fraud.)
http://www.ieciraq.org/English/Frameset_english.htm
.The situation in Iraq can only be rectified by abandoning the Sectarian Policies and:
1 Scrapping the US imposed Constitution.
2. Scrapping the parliament and government.
3. Scrapping the sectarian Security Forces and Army.
4. Withdrawing US forces in favor of a UN mandate for Iraq and UN forces (not including any of the coalition forces).
5. An interim government of neutral professional bureaucrats for two years.
6. A new modern non-sectarian Constitution.
7. Election of Parliament at the end of the two year interim period. ETC.
Faruq Ziada (Former Iraqi Ambassador)

hillary is the leader of the pack of nearly identical candidates.

why waste time discussing the others views when their differences are minimal?

this is implied when Ritter writes:

“she is as shallow as the next candidate”

The solution to this mess is just to leave. 60 to 90 days and out. Period. No “diplomatic presence,” no “economic support” (hell, they have oil for christsake!), nothing.

We have our own - and ever increasing - problems at home. (No need to detail what those are.) That is our true area of concern, and not the problems of the various regions of the - for now anyway - ex-Turkish Empire that are still in any number of ways backward looking and still stuck in the 16th Century.

This - the sum total of all their political and ethnic and religious problems - is something that they need to settle amongst themselves without a lot of outside interference from people they’ve grown to hate. We - Western European civilization - had our 30 years war and got it all out of our system. (When is the last time you wondered, or even cared, if the guy next door was Catholic?) Perhaps they need to do the same?

“Yes,” you reply,“but we need the gas!”

Look, they need our money so whoever’s finally in charge will be happy to sell oil to whomever shows up. That, and we’re at a tipping point on energy technologies, and so pretty soon we won’t need their oil and they can all go back to being goat herders. Indeed, in just a few years our kids be looking at oil technology the same way we look at the coal fired steam technology of the late 19th century. In a word: “quaint”.

I like analogies, so look at it this way: This region is lika a roof that leaks on a house a few blocks over. You feel for the guy with the leaky roof. But wait! Your roof is leaking too, and your plumbing is shot, and you have termites, and the diswasher is broken, and the lawn has gone to seed, and….

In a case like that, trying to fix the leaks in the other guy’s roof is foolishness if your own is threatening to cave in. People who see you do it will think you a fool. Well meaning to be sure, but a fool just the same.

Summing up: We have our own problems, and the mess is Iraq and the Middle East is a Tarbaby (as my Mother and Grandmother - sensible women both - like to put it). The sooner we get out of there the better.

I’m surprised that only one comment and nothing in the article about the one politician that has been against this war from the beginning and is running on the platform of immediate withdraw of U.S forces from the area.

If we had a Ron Paul / George Washington / Thomas Jefferson approach to foreign entanglements we wouldn’t be in this mess which includes the coming bankruptcy of this country since lack of courage keeps us funding these perpetual wars with FED created money.

As Ron has said, our involvement will end one way or another when the currency collapses. How bad it will be depends on how fast we stop the insanity of trying to rule the world.

Sorry, all of you folks make some very faulty assumptions

1. The majority of Americans aren’t warmongers
2. Americans can’t be fooled by politicians (again and again).

We have Kucinich & Paul running who will get out of Iraq immediately and they are at the bottom of the polls. Is there a disconnect here?  I’ve got a quote, the truth of which is unassailable…

“Naturally the common people don’t want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.” Hermann Goering

I agree with most of what Mr. Ritter say’s, after all he had his boots on the ground in Iraq. But just as he was made to look unpatriotic and was mistreated by the mainstream media at the time, it is happening all over again.

This time the media is black-balling Presidential candidate Dr. Ron Paul. He wants immediate withdrawal from Iraq, he never voted for it or for it’s funding. Even more importantly, he voted against the Patriot Act because he read it. He wants to do away with what is the American Empire abroad. We currently have over 750 military bases in over 130 countries. We simply cannot afford to be the world’s self appointed police, judge and executioner. He is the only candidate with this consistant measage, and has a well funded grass-root support to back it up.

I am an ex-Democrat and am so discussed with the single minded, lock step candidates that we are spoon fed with by the mainstream news people. No real issues are being seriously discussed and we assume we must forcefully guide the rest of the world, while we suffer terribly at home with loss of liberty and a degrading infrustucture. We bombed bridges, schools and sewer systems in Iraq and now must repair them, while ours are seriously degrading. When are we going to wake up and choose a leader that understands and follows the Constitution, after all, it is what thet swear an oath to uphold.

Every American intervention only begets new problems requiring new interventions, while seldom, if ever, solving the conditions of the original intervention.  Our foreign policy resembles heroin addiction.  We need the drug to overcome the withdrawal symptoms, but of course we only become more addicted.  At some point we will have to go cold turkey, accept some negative consequences from withdrawal, but return to normal life. Normal life is not thinking that security depends on global dominance.  The USA alone sees itself threatened by events everywhere on Earth and thus needs a global empire of bases spanning 130 countries.  This costs our children 727 billion a year.  We spend more on military than the rest of the world combined.  But if terrorism be the threat we face these conventional military expenditures do nothing to protect us, and the wars we fight and the proxy regimes we support only increase the hatred that nourishes the ranks of the terrorists.  But if we didn’t spend borrowed money to support the military,what would happen to the American economy?  So our addiction is both political and economic.  We should have heeded Pres Eisenhower when he warned against the military-industrial complex.  So long as it rules our country,we are not free.  We do not have a republic of the people, by the people, for the people, but we are subjects and servants of empire,paying tribute through exorbitant taxes and the taxes on our children for policies that only harm us.  Ron Paul is right.  Take back America.

My thanks to Scott Ritter for doing as he always does, providing me with real information about events in Iraq and not just opinion.

In light of the facts as he outlines them, however, one piece of criticism does not ring true - that of the Kurds of Iraq.  Why, given that the “government” in Baghdad is so fractured, so baseless, so hopeless of ever even surviving a U.S. withdrawal, should the Kurds be encouraged to bargain away their oil wealth, their God-given patrimony, to cement themselves into this unstable and corrupt Iraqi coalition? Would Scott do this if he were a Kurd? Much better for them, it seems to me, even better than an independent state that would immediately be at war with Turkey, is to forge an agreement which gives them automony within the TURKISH state, in fact would expand their borders to include all of present day Turkish Kurdistan, which itself is the seat of much rebellion within that country.  Kurds get an expanded automonous state in which they can govern themselves, and the Turks get peace within and without their borders and the profit of the Kurd’s vast oil wealth to boot.  Obviously both sides will have to eat some crow and swallow some pride as a dessert, but aren’t the gains to be realized on both sides worth the bargain?  And then, the remaining Iraqis, Shiia and Sunni may decide to get serious about making peace lest the Iranians decide to march in and take the rest of their oilfields.

“Maybe we should out source this job( president) as these same representatives have been so ready to out source our American jobs.”

The Whitehouse was outsourced to Tel Aviv many years ago.

True enough, seabeckR.  Iraqis and Afghans are suffering unbearable misery. Making things right is the discussion I’d appreciate.

Another great article from Scott,

but Hillary’s quote that she

“will not hesitate to go toe to toe with Republicans in the debates to end the war as quickly and responsibly as possible.”

As if right now and the past five years as a U.S. Senator during this farce war was premature.  I hope noone really buys this load of shit.  She needs to be President first before she can help end the war quickly and responsibly?  Hillary should be leading the charge of impeachment and ending the war quickly right NOW.  What a joke she’s been one of the biggest supporters of the Bush administration even compared to some Republicans.

Too bad these sites don’t collect a fine everytime someone makes a personal, ad hominem attack. The issues are tough enough as it is. Why pour oil on the fire except to revel in the flames?

Well, maybe that cosmic karma counter is still registering debits.

The whole “business leader” thing inspires such confidence, especially since the unrestrained free markets have done such wonders in the world of finance of late.

Yep, more of that genius is exactly what we need, if we want to become a broke, isolated backwater with our media focused on hyping paranoia, and a security state giving us damn good reason to BE paranoid.

I understand that Clinton is positioning herself as a centrists, and representing all people in the US is the duty of the president, but a strong moral compass is needed first and foremost.  The current administration has commited crimes against international law and our Constitution, and instead of the people accepting that this is simply the way things are now and therefore we must deal with it, we should be looking for someone to stand up provide a clear and direct counterforce to these morally reprehensible policies - not tweek them and tinker with them.  A dead tree will never bear fruit no matter how much rain it receives. 

If a KKK group lies its way into national power, ought the opposing political party pander to KKK activists and attempt to work within the framework of racism they established?  Of course not.  We need a repudiation of the policies we know are un-American and a candidate to get up lead on principles of truth and justice (it may sound like I’m advocating Superman for president, but honestly, any national leader must have a strong sense of both, otherwise nations loose their way, as is evidenced at this current epoch in our history). Otherwise, its like replacing a window on a condemned house and calling it home.

Accepting the current US policy as valid disqualifies Clinton as far as I’m concerned, and seeks power for power’s sake, so she panders wherever she thinks her compromises will buy the best results.  Ron Paul is the only one willing to address the US foriegn policy and the establishment’s vision of the role of the military and call it for what it is - un-American.  The rest of the candidates from either party seem tragically phony and contrived by focus groups.

Expat, thank you, you’re right. We have the power to act at the local level and influence change.

It can start w/the simple act of cancelling cable TV/MSM subscribtions.

Had to read this piece slowly. There’s so much there to try and understand. By page 2, I was thankful that Ritter had offered a useful option:  “For my money, I choose working with the Sunnis and al-Sadr to create a viable coalition…” This is not, I’m guessing, intended as a solution, more as a potent catalyst. I’d like to see a regional Islamic conference convened (at our behest), one which is widely inclusive. Infighting bred by being “widely inclusive,” can be minimized by severely narrowing the task/goal of the conference: setting up, within 90 days, the equivalent of a Governorship to oversee a new and legitimate national election in Iraq and to have full authority to make administrative decisions until the new government is formed. By full authority, I mean the Governorship would also publish a suggested timeline for withdrawal of all foreign forces and fighters.

The effectiveness of this Governorship might be assured by its composition, a dozen or so elder statesmen of the region. No hotheads, young guys or outsiders.

Finally, if the US wishes for such an approach to actually work, the group described must be provided with a large, competent staff which will steer the required US monetary investment in rebuilding the country. Once the federal Iraqi gov is in place, the suggested guiding body can be incorporated as a private, non-partisan advisory panel.

I really believe that Mitt Romney is the best choice for America.  He is more qualified than any other candidate on both sides. 

Romney is a master at business strategy, and I think that he has the unique background to strategically place America as a force for good in the world, unite moderate Muslim Nations on the premise of rejecting the extreme, and ultimately making America more safe and prosperous.

Mitt Will Win!!!