Iraqis Wasting An Opportunity, U.S. Officers Say (Yep, it's all their fault!)

Iraqis Wasting An Opportunity, U.S. Officers Say
With Attacks Ebbing, Government Is Urged to Reach Out to Opponents

By Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, November 15, 2007; Page A01

CAMP LIBERTY, Iraq -- Senior military commanders here now portray the intransigence of Iraq's Shiite-dominated government as the key threat facing the U.S. effort in Iraq, rather than al-Qaeda terrorists, Sunni insurgents or Iranian-backed militias.

In more than a dozen interviews, U.S. military officials expressed growing concern over the Iraqi government's failure to capitalize on sharp declines in attacks against U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians. A window of opportunity has opened for the government to reach out to its former foes, said Army Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the commander of day-to-day U.S. military operations in Iraq, but "it's unclear how long that window is going to be open."

The lack of political progress calls into question the core rationale behind the troop buildup President Bush announced in January, which was premised on the notion that improved security would create space for Iraqis to arrive at new power-sharing arrangements. And what if there is no such breakthrough by next summer? "If that doesn't happen," Odierno said, "we're going to have to review our strategy."

Brig. Gen. John F. Campbell, deputy commanding general of the 1st Cavalry Division, complained last week that Iraqi politicians appear out of touch with everyday citizens. "The ministers, they don't get out," he said. "They don't know what the hell is going on on the ground." Campbell noted approvingly that Lt. Gen. Aboud Qanbar, the top Iraqi commander in the Baghdad security offensive, lately has begun escorting cabinet officials involved in health, housing, oil and other issues out of the Green Zone to show them, as Campbell put it, "Hey, I got the security, bring in the essential services."

Indeed, some U.S. Army officers now talk more sympathetically about former insurgents than they do about their ostensible allies in the Shiite-led central government. "It is painful, very painful," dealing with the obstructionism of Iraqi officials, said Army Lt. Col. Mark Fetter. As for the Sunni fighters who for years bombed and shot U.S. soldiers and now want to join the police, Fetter shrugged. "They have got to eat," he said over lunch in the 1st Cavalry Division's mess hall here. "There are so many we've detained and interrogated, they did what they did for money."

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/14/AR2007111402524.html

Iraqis are waiting for you to leave so they can fight it out and decide for themselves who is going to run their country.

Oddly, they don't think American infidels should make that decision for them

Sounds alot like many politicians in this country.

The onus is on *Co,, not the military. Separation of duties.

If Condi is too busy shopping or rousing congressional support on behalf of * to do her job, it's not for the military to pick up the slack. They've got enough to do.

the military's only true purpose is to kill people and break things. Of course, he sais this about Clinton when the big charge was that our military shouldn't be the world's policemen. Now, they're Iraq's policemen, and town mayors, and service-providers, and diplomats, but it's OK if it's under a Repub administration.

well, they're just learning from their masters, in this regard.