Civil War in Iraq? Could it Happen? At What Cost?

Civil war in Iraq. Is it a possibility? Since day one of our countries little excursion into that country to look for weapons of mass destruction, no wait, to enforce the UN resolutions, no wait, to oust Saddam, no wait, to enforce the resolutions, oust Saddam, and kind of look for weapons, no wait to bring the Iraqis democracy, no wait, to inform the Iraqis that they are better off without Saddam, to enforce the UN resolutions, to oust Saddam, and to bring democracy, and if we find any weapons of mass destruction we can then say we told you so! Ya, that's the ticket. I suppose we could go on about this all day with the end result of somebody a little right of center leaving me a comment about me being some kind of "left-wing liberal, blue-state, God-hating, fag-loving jerkoff " and how I don't understand the world, or George Bush, and his vision for the world. I, after reading the comment and feigning indescribable mental anguish would write a comment back to that person most likely describing them as some kind of "narrow minded, right-wing conservative, red-state, gun-toting, anti-gay jerkoff." Blah, blah, blah! You get the picture. I've seen it and read it all over some of these blog sites. Some of the comment sections are pretty funny and are actually better written than the blogs. Unfortunately, that's not why I have called you all together today.

We could all argue until the world ends, I'm sure, about whether or not it was the right or the wrong thing to do sending troops into Iraq. I don't think there are too many people on earth that would argue the Iraqis are better off without Saddam. I am however, beginning to have doubts about the price we as a nation, and we as a people are paying now, and the price that we and our children will pay in the future. Please do not be so naive as to think that the country will not pay a price for the fight against terrorism. It may be financial, military, social, economic, or God forbid a disaster in the form of another horrendous attack, which would encompass all of the aforementioned, but we will pay a price.

As we have all seen on the television news, especially cable news, the closer we get to the elections in Iraq the more the frequency of insurgent attacks escalates and the stronger these attacks become. The attacks have also become more widespread of late, and instead of one or two per day, you now have up to five or six per day. This takes some planning. Recently, General John Abazaid, the commander of U.S. Central Command stated that he thought between actual fighters and active supporters of the insurgency that there were an estimated 20,000 of them. He said that a couple of days ago. That is quite a difference from last November when he thought the number was more like 5,000. General Muhammed Abdullah al-Shahwani, the director of Iraqis new Intelligence Service said that the number of insurgents was more likely near 30,000. We keep hearing that we have killed thousands of terrorists and insurgents. If you believe all of the numbers thrown around, al Queda should be hanging on by a thread and the number of insurgents in Iraq should be diminishing, not increasing. What I am sure of is that every day something in Iraq blows up, somebody else gets killed, another soldier, another insurgent, or another civilian, another coalition soldier gets killed, another wife becomes a widow, another child becomes fatherless or motherless, another Muslim martyr is created, and another job opening is created for a young, poor, out of work, under-educated, America hating Arab teenager or young man. There doesn't seem to be any shortage of them.

There has been some talk lately of some kind of time-table for the withdrawal of American troops to begin sometime after the Iraqi election at the end of January 2005. If I was Donald Rumsfeld, or "W" I think that I would consider getting started on one pronto. What I fear more than anything after the elections is the eruption of civil war. Nonsense you say. Maybe, but I will tell you why. Let's just say that there are 30,000 insurgents in the country hell-bent on creating a haven for terrorists, Saddam loyalists, al Queda, you pick something. Most, if not all of these insurgent types are probably Sunni or Wahabe Muslims. They don't like the Shia and they have no love lost for the Kurds. The Kurds, however; are tough sons of bitches and they've just about got a separate country and a well trained army. They also have a hole-card - Turkey. Let's say that the Sunnis boycott the elections and the Shia win every Iraqi seat from Fallujah to Bazra to Baghdad. The Shia who were so oppressed under Saddam are now thinking happy days are here finally. Wrong!

First of all, the international community led by you know who cries foul. The French scream bogus elections and do not recognize the newly elected government of Iraq. Now what? OK, the US cries foul, makes a big stink at the UN and screams back at France and anybody else on board with them that they can't do that. Meanwhile, back in Iraq you've got 30,000 screaming insurgent Sunni's who now start making life miserable for the Shia's again by attacking and murdering anything that moves drawing the whole country into war. Now, since the Shia's are duly elected they have no option but to fight now. But, don't kid yourself, the Shia's are tough sons of bitches also. They invented terrorism way back when. So now all hell is breaking loose! In the middle of all of this the Kurds who have a good thing going up north say screw this, basically secede their territory and ask Turkey if they can join up with them. Since there are a lot of Kurds in Turkey and this is just the excuse that Turkey has been waiting for, they say sure. What would we do? Invade Turkey. Don't think so. Don't friggen' laugh and don't kid yourself, it could happen. Unless there is some kind of tip-toe diplomacy in the next few weeks I'd almost bet that's what the insurgents want. The insurgents just want some kind of a terrorist playground back. No one said that they were the brightest bulbs on the billboard for not knowing that the world will never let that happen no matter what. So you see, Iraq could still turn into one hell of a bigger mess than it already is. I finally think that some of those gung-ho neocons in Washington are finally getting the point. Again, I am not taking sides here. Life, nor the world is that simple, but if you are going to become involved in the business of nation building, you had better hire the best people with the best resumes, and the best plans. What's the old saying? "The best layed plans of mice and men."

I'm sure that eventually all of this will be ironed out. We will eventually get fighting terrorism down to a fine science. We will get the UN to realize that fighting terrorism is in everybody's interest and all freedom loving countries of the world will eventually see the freedom light and eventually terrorism will be defeated. It'll most likely be long after I'm dead and a lot of other people are lost to this disease. That's just what it is, a malignant disease. I also hope that in 100 years, if we, the world community are all still here, that in some kids history class some teacher doesn't have to spend a week explaining to his or her class why the cost to defeat this enemy was so much. Why didn't people learn earlier? What was the cost in dollars and cents? What was the cost to our humanity? What was the cost in human life and why did it cost so much life?