I tried to refrain from snarkily pointing out that the graph below is not simply what one should expect from the NY Times but also from someone named Dexter Filkins. My bad, I failed.
It also highlighted what has become the single most confounding paradox of Iraq's and America's three-year-old war: that the democratic process, seen as the main hope for ending the violence, has been unable to stop it. Two constitutions, two elections and a referendum later, Iraq is reeling toward more chaos, not less.
Where has it ever been thought that democracy alone would stop the terrorists from fighting in Iraq? Filkins leaves the impression that it's just the good old average Iraqi who should have been waiting for democracy to come along so they could all join hands, vote, sing kumbaya and put down their weapons. What a silly premise given what we know of the terrorist element in Iraq.
Someone needs to inform Mr. Filkins that, indeed, a democratic Iraq, and eventually a greater Middle-East, is far less likely to gas its population, wage war on non-threatening neighbors, or allow armed terrorists to roam its streets. Conflating that concept with a few elections stopping all the terrorists in Iraq is misleading, at best.
just another reminder of the horrible sacrifices made by so many Iraqis who have signed on to the American-backed democratic project here
Of course, Filkins wouldn't entertain the notion that there are many Iraqis who wanted and still want freedom, whether it's an American ideal supported through our military resolve, or not. No, surely those brown people can't think for themselves. This terrible quest for freedom is all America's fault. Filkins seems to play close to the racist N Y Times line - Arabs just can't possibly be democratic.
Mr. Hanoon said the ugliness that forced him to flee was not a passing phenomenon, but the final measure of Iraq's Sunnis. When he packed his belongings and prepared to leave, he said, not a single one of his Sunni neighbors stopped by to say goodbye.
"It's in their genes," he said. "It's a disease. They hate the Shiites. I don't think things will ever go back to normal between Shiites and Sunnis."
Not to downplay the issues between the factions in Iraq - but all one need do is consider race relations in the US. How long has it been now since the Emancipation Proclamation, almost 150 years? And only a superficial fool would pronounce those relations as ideal today. But given Filkin's logic, we should have given up and gone to an apartheid system by 1870, or so. Oh wait, I thought apartheid wasn't good, either? Hmm, well maybe we should have simply sent all those Africans back, or simply given them Des Moines at the time.
It amazes me how these allegedly in the know elitists at the NY Times can be so short-sighted and tunnel-visioned at the same time. I agree that there are monumental forces at work in Iraq, not all of them good. But such forces need time to work themselves out. The ultimate measure of success in Iraq today is not the realization of some endgame. It is the notable progress consistently made along the way.
But then the NY Times isn't interested in telling that story, either. Come to think of it, there really isn't much they offer worth listening to these days unless you are intent on looking for ways to rationalize defeat. The evolution of a new Iraq may one day accommodate a sector-ing of sorts. But that's for the Iraqis to decide, not the N Y Times, and no one should deem it a solution prematurely because they lack the patience, or strength of conviction for war.
If you want some good news, here's a fascinating look at certain events on the ground in Iraq. Be sure and click through to the entire Marine Corp Times article.
Just nine days before al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi released his latest video, a special operations raid killed five of his men, captured five others and apparently came within a couple of city blocks of nabbing Zarqawi himself.
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