I must agree with John. The president of Iraq is worried now of his own fate if and when our forces are pulled out.

I would like to see more regular "common" folks from Iraq use the BLOG to express their personal views or suggestions for resolving this issue.

I believe that the first and gravest mistake made was when the United States’ government decided to invade Iraq in the first place. It’s obvious that there existed political and economic interests from the get go. I cannot believe wholly the argument that the military invasion of Iraq surged directly from the need to liberate it from a dictatorship. The problem now has been extended. It has not only affected the well-being of United States’ soldiers involved but has now amassed to a huge conflict that principally targets the Iraqi population. Now, in my perspective, I feel that the mistakes have been too many and we cannot afford to make another one. The violence has been steady for quite some time and it seems to be that the main concern to retire from the area is due to the fact that the government has gone past its proposed budget. We definitely can’t blame the appointed Iraqi government for its incapacity to suppress the sectarian violence. They have little to no security infrastructure and most importantly, no social stability. Therefore, any plans enacted in the future must be for the benefit of the Iraqi people and should discard any future interests of the United States in the area. If it means withdrawing troops at a slower pace for the safeguard of the country, it sadly needs to be done now. It’s up for those on top to begin thinking without inhibitions about personal interests and to focus strictly on the well-being of a country who has already lived the worse. Just like at first, we didn’t leave them alone and forced an uninvited military occupation, we cannot leave them alone on this one. Now, our intentions must be for their benefit, not ours.

"We are now seeing the geopolitical implications of our actions in Iraq, we should withdraw to the borders and leave the civil unrest to the Iraqis.."-From 'THE ARMCHAIR'

The public comments of jihad and terrorist of various backgrounds are still nothing more than the howling of "glory hounds", its the duty of the intelligence community to find out, which groups are composed of old men shaking their fist at the setting sun with their sympathetic children, and which groups actually have the resources and incentive to carry out an attack on American interests.
We lack clear definition of the enemy, I am beginning to believe a "Safe Haven" for terrorists is exactly what we need...(try hitting the bulls-eye without a target)

Here is one thing I notice as a common trend amongst everyone writing comments in this blog, NOBODY CAN SPEAK WITH ANY CERTAINTY WHAT IS GOING ON. Well I'm in IRAQ reading your comments. The people of Iraq are divided and religously persecuting each other over who the true lineage of Mohammad follows. Dr. Castegnara you must be an eternal optimist. One thing we should all remember is there is a lesson here and it is one of Patriotism remember we are Americans and in the USA you don't kill someone because they are a Sunni or a Shia this is what occupies the minds of the people of Iraq. How am I going to survive today? Patriotism gained by a common goal of Peace and fair distribution of Oil revenue will prove the insurgents wrong, allow the US to leave, and disrupt the enemies IRAN and SYRIA's true agenda. Lets also not forget our relatively recent history and remember Iraq was at war with Iran and Iran is now opening its arms. College students in Iran can't be heard because of religously oppresive governments. We in America Stand for Freedom and Equality of all People this is a foreign concept to the Middle East. A Middle east rich in history of violence and power struggles of tribes and religous sects trying to secure their interest not the peoples interest. As we disect this issue we also are enemies to our own ideas of unity we don't provide any sense of security in the people of Iraq when the worlds only existing superpower can't work our way ideologically through this issue. The lack of faith in our leaders and trust in ourselves is translating to the people of Iraq.

'Faith' is for fools. Faith indicates that you believe something despite having no evidence for it. I cannot abide faith.

This mess was predicted. This strife was forseen. No ammount of US money or lives can fix it. When you attempt the impossible, you are destined to lose.

The USA lost this little arrogant ploy the day G.W.Bush thought it up. I'd rather have Nixon than Bush!

I say put sniper teams on every tall building in the country, and break out the night scopes. Fly over and drop leaflets telling them you will by all weapons turned in. Give them a week to get their stuff together. After one week, tell them to throw down their arms, or die on the spot. After you kill a few terrorist, no one will carry any weapons.Watch at night after curfew for people planting IED`s and lay a scope on their butt and fire.After a few weeks of this, they will give it up, or there will be one hell of a firefight.If you invade a country, you must eliminate their fire power,so all they have left is rocks to throw.It`s time we quit pussy footing around, and act like we know what the hell were doing.If they invaded our country, they would strip us of our weapons, and our two way radios.If you can`t shoot back, you usually do what your told. I think this would save a lot of lives ,not take them. Those that want you to set them free will be glad to see you, those that hate you will try to harm you, so KILL THEM, and let the others live. Then everybodys happy.

I am so disgusted with this war that has been going on for so long. I wish that in the last election that BUSH could be voted out as all of his followers that don't have the backbone to disagree with him.

As I write this I am hearing that President Bush has decided to put off a decision on a new course until January. Does this indicate that this administration had NO contingincy plans whatsoever? Does it indicate that he intends to go against the advice of his Generals and send more troops into this stupid sh** box of his own construction? I think his plan is to drop this on the American people after the holidays and then, as Darth Cheny says, it is full speed ahead. He has no election to worry about and so has nothing to loose in a last desperate hail mary effort to salvage some sort of legacy other then that whis is his due. If the niether the Dems or the Republicans can develop enough spine to stop this deranged fool then we will need to do this ourselves in the streets. If this insanity is still going on during both parties National Conventions then BOTH parties conventions need disrupted. After that we need to show up at the national mall and be heard and seen. The campuses need to be shut down along with the economy in a general strike.... Oh well. Maybe in a participatory democracy.
BRING THEM HOME!

Robert,
That was the most idiotic statement I have ever seen in writing. Myself and the rest of the people that have read it are now dumber, thanks to you. I was in Iraq for 2 years, and...
1. Do you know how large Iraq is? If every single one of the U.S. troops in Iraq right now (140,000)was a sniper (It's actually a fraction of 1%) it still would be no where near enough to cover half of the country.
2. No Iraqis openly carry weapons. Without a U.S. issued weapons card, it is already known that anyone with a weapon will be shot.
3. I'm not sure if you've seen many pictures of Iraq, but it's not exactly Manhattan, there really aren't too many tall buildings.
4. The patrols as much area as possible to prevent IEDs from being planted, but again, not nearly enough troops to cover a fraction of the sector.
5. There are 6 million people that live in Baghdad, the good guys look the same as the bad guys, it is nearly impossible to differentiate the two.
...I could go on and on but I think you get the point, don't quit your day job general.

Wow Sean, another gem into your policital insight. "Faith is for fools," and so you think that the vast majority of this country (Democrats as well as Republicans are religious, be it Muslim, Jewish, Christian, Buddhism, Hinduism, Native American, Wiccan, Agnostic, Deistic, Pagan, Satanist, et al) is foolish? I suppose that the atheists are the only smart people in the country.

Even being an Atheist means you have faith. Faith that there isn't a God. Everyone has faith in something. You may have faith in your girlfriend, even if you don't have any evidence that she isn't cheating on you.

And you say when you attempt the impossible, you are sure to lose. Well, were the Wright brothers told that it was possible to fly? Did we know it was possible to go into space and land on the moon? Were we sure that it was possible to break the sound barrier?

There are very few definite impossibilities. There's even a possibility that if you jump out of a plane with a parachute, you can survive.

So for someone who seems to put their faith in science and math, can you say without even .0000001% doubt that faith is for the fools?

Regardless, to your next comment. The bloody religious war going on in Iraq has nothing to do with Saddam not being there, it has to do with us not being there enough. Saddam didn't force Sunna and Shi'a to get married and live in the same neighborhoods. Saddam didn't force Sunna and Shi'a couples to fall in love.

The reason this happened is because we didn't have a firm grip on things and let them slip ahead of us from the beginning. We let the people who wanted this to happen do what they planned. It wasn't Iraqis that blew up the Samarra mosque, it was people under the guidance of Al-Qaeda in Iraq.

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