Pentagon voices optimism on Iraq's 'tough reality'

[Eugene]

Pentagon voices optimism on Iraq's 'tough reality'
19 Sep 2005 21:36:33 GMT

Source: Reuters
By Will Dunham

WASHINGTON, Sept 19 (Reuters) - The Pentagon said on Monday there was
reason for optimism in Iraq despite what it called the "tough reality"
of a war in which insurgent violence rages unbated and the U.S.
military death toll approaches 2,000.

Two-and-a-half years after American-led forces invaded Iraq to oust
President Saddam Hussein, U.S. officials tout political progress --
saying every important milestone has been achieved including a draft
constitution -- and the steady building of Iraqi security forces.

But some defense experts, saying insurgencies like this one can take
years to unfold, argued the conflict had become a military stalemate
and expressed concern about civil war. They also said an erosion in
U.S. public support for the war should be a worrisome development for
President George W. Bush.

Chief Pentagon spokesman Lawrence Di Rita urged people not to gauge
the war based on the volume of rebel bombings. "That's not a good way
to determine how good or bad things are going -- by (counting) how
many things are exploding," Di Rita said.

<snip>

More: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N19156397.htm

Political progress? Iraq is sliding into civil war.
There just isn't enough lipstick to dress up this pig.

[Lost-in-FL]

1. Optimism?? ROFL

:rofl: :rofl:

Yes Commander in Shit we want more of it... make it hurt!!! Send another 2,000 soldiers to their deaths for freedom, make us broke and proud sir!! :sarcasm: :sarcasm:

[jzodda]

2. LMAO

Lets see, first I read about 2 weeks ago that most of the major insurgent groups have merged with that Zarquai guy taking the lead role now.

Then a week later I read Zarquai declares war on the Shiites

Then hundreds start to die in mass bombings

Things are really looking up!

[applegrove]

3. Optimism on tough reality? Now they want us to look at reality?

Wow! What an idea? Is that the newest thing off the neocon press?

:rofl:

Neocons. First they invented the idea of myths. Then they invent "reality". Man those PNAC people are brilliant. What will they invent next - cause i have to get to the store but find triangular the wheel a little bumpy.

[The_Casual_Observer]

4. The forced bullshit "milestone" achievements are all worthless

political gestures meant only for that kind of self serving "progress report". Nobody, including those generals, could possibly believe that that lopsided constitution will serve any purpose other than to accelerate the insurgency and civil war.

[Warren DeMontague]

5. Optimism: Hey, we're still not openly fighting the KURDS!

How's that for progress?

[MADem]

6. Shades of VIETNAM and the LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL

Interesting article, comparing the two: http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0623-26.htm

"They're starting to talk numbers again," Pat Lang remarked to me about the return of body counts. Lang is the former chief at the Defense Intelligence Agency for the Middle East, south Asia and counter-terrorism. "They were determined not to do that. But they can't provide a measurement to tell themselves they're doing well. As you know, it means nothing."

Lang, who served as an intelligence officer in Vietnam, observes: "For almost all of the war, Vietnam was a better situation than Iraq. During the conduct of the war the security situation was far better than this." The Iraqi elections are "irrelevant to the outcome of the war because the people who voted were the people who stood to gain".

Iran is the long-term winner. "Iran intends to pull the Shia state of Iraq into its orbit. You can be sure that Iranian revolutionary guards are honeycombed throughout Iraq's intelligence to make sure things don't get out of hand." About the "euphoria" after the election, especially echoed by the press corps, Lang simply says: "Laughable, comical, pathetic."

Bush's Iraq syndrome is a reinvention of Lyndon Johnson's Vietnam syndrome. In December 1967, Walt Rostow, LBJ's national security adviser, famously declared about the Vietcong and the North Vietnamese: "Their casualties are going up at a rate they cannot sustain ... I see light at the end of the tunnel." The official invitation to the New Year's Eve party at the US embassy in Saigon read: "Come see the light at the end of the tunnel." The Tet offensive struck a month later.

[ladylibertee]

7. WHATEVER dudes.