Iraq
The US is now the "occupying power" in Iraq. How is it progressing? What are the patterns ... or contrasts? Are there parallels to Israel's role in the occupied territories?
Tuesday, August 31, 2004
Iraq: A No-Win Situation :Sunni triangle has fallen under rebel control: pro-US representatives assassinated, intimidated, executed
The New York Times > Opinion > Op-Ed Columnist: A No-Win Situation: "By PAUL KRUGMAN | Published: August 31, 2004
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Ever since the uprising in April, the Iraqi town of Falluja has in effect been a small, nasty Islamic republic. But what about the rest of the Sunni triangle?
Last month a Knight-Ridder report suggested that U.S. forces were effectively ceding many urban areas to insurgents. Last Sunday The Times confirmed that while the world's attention was focused on Najaf, western Iraq fell firmly under rebel control. Representatives of the U.S.-installed government have been intimidated, assassinated or executed.
Other towns, like Samarra, have also fallen to insurgents. Attacks on oil pipelines are proliferating.
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Fred Kaplan of Slate is even more pessimistic. "This is a terribly grim thing to say," he wrote recently, "but there might be no solution to the problem of Iraq" - no way to produce "a stable, secure, let alone democratic regime. And there's no way we can just pull out without plunging the country, the region, and possibly beyond into still deeper disaster." Deeper disaster? Yes: people who worried about Ramadi are now worrying about Pakistan.
