A Nation Soaked in Blood Tears Itself Apart

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

By Patrick Cockburn

http://counterpunch.org/patrick12302006.html

<snip>

Iraq is disintegrating. In areas where there was a mixed population--above all in Baghdad itself--there have been mass killings. After the Samarra bomb, the capital began to divide up into hostile districts, each protected by its own militiamen. The militias themselves became stronger as everybody wanted armed men they could trust at the end of their street. Shia and Sunni families--whichever was in a minority--received letters, often enclosing bullets, telling them to move within 24 hours or be killed. Few dared to stay.

By the end of the year, the UN High Commission for Refugees estimated that 1.6 million Iraqis had fled within the country and another 1.8 million had gone abroad, mostly to Jordan and Syria. At one point, an estimated 1,000 people a day were crossing the border into Jordan and a further 2,000 a day into Syria.

Can anybody put Iraq back together again? As Iraqi and American politicians announced that they opposed partition, the country was undergoing de facto division. The worst fighting was in places like the fruit-growing province of Diyala, where Sunni and Shia are evenly balanced in numbers. The chief of police in the provincial capital Baquba estimated that 9,000 people had been killed, mainly Shia. Sectarianism penetrated everywhere. There is one Iraqi army division in Diyala but it is almost entirely Shia. It only arrests Sunni. The same pattern is seen across Iraq.

In Baghdad, people in the Sunni enclave of al-Adhamiyah demanded that an army battalion be moved from their area because it was Shia. The Sunni regard the Baghdad police and police commandos as Shia death-squads in uniform...

[shance]

1. Iraq hasn't torn itself apart. The Bush Administrations have torn it apart.

n/t

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

2. BushCo is completely...

...responsible for what has become of Iraq. I don't think Cockburn is trying to suggest otherwise. I think he's trying to help us understand the anatomy of the mess that's currently going on there.