Opposing views of Iraq’s future

Lauren Frayer of the Washington Times reports Al-Maliki’s giddieness at the decline in violence against Iraqis;

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said yesterday that suicide attacks and other bombings in the Iraqi capital have dropped dramatically since last year’s high, calling it a sign of the end of sectarian violence. A top U.S. general here said he thinks the drop is sustainable, as Iraqis turn away from extremists.

Mr. al-Maliki said “terrorist acts,” including car bombings and other spectacular, al Qaeda-style attacks, dropped 77 percent. He called it a sign that Sunni-Shi’ite violence was nearly gone from Baghdad.

“We are all realizing now that what Baghdad was seeing every day — dead bodies in the streets and morgues — is ebbing remarkably,” Mr. al-Maliki told reporters at his office in the U.S.-guarded Green Zone.

“This is an indication that sectarianism intended as a gate of evil and fire in Iraq is now closed,” he said.

Sounds great, doesn’t it? Well, we can’t have that, can we? So let’s go the Washington Post – we can always depend on the Post to bring us down;

The U.S. effort to organize nearly 70,000 local fighters to solidify security gains in Iraq is facing severe political and logistical challenges as U.S.-led forces struggle to manage the recruits and the central government resists incorporating them into the Iraqi police and army, according to senior military officials.

Gen. David H. Petraeus and other top commanders have hailed the initiative to enlist Iraqi tribes and former insurgents in the battle against extremist groups, but leaders of Iraq’s Shiite-dominated government have feared that the local fighters known as “volunteers” — more than 80 percent of whom are Sunni — could eventually mount an armed opposition, Iraqi and U.S. officials said.

“Could eventually”. The Post is more interested in predicting doom and gloom scenarios than actually reporting news. We don’t need analysis, we need facts. Reporters are historically poor analysts.

All of you goofballs at the Post need to learn something – we want the news, not predictions. Last year you told us that Iraq was mired in a civil war and that turned out to be wrong. The sectarian violence was based on the predictions of the US press that Democrats would prematurely withdraw troops from Iraq and leave the Iraqis high and dry. When the President decided to increase troops levels, that proved to Iraqis that we were there for the long haul despite the mewling of the Left – and they jumped on board instead of fighting for personal bits of Iraq politics. 

Category: Media, Politics