U.S. ignored Shiite militias, focused on Sunni insurgency

[ECH1969]

U.S. officials were warned for more than two years that Shiite Muslim militias were infiltrating Iraq's security forces and taking control of neighborhoods, but they failed to take action to counteract it, Iraqi and American officials said.

Now American officials call the militias the primary security concern in Iraq, blaming them for more civilian deaths than the Sunni Muslim-based insurgency and demanding that the Iraqi government move quickly to stem their influence.

U.S. officials concede that they didn't act, in part because they were focused on fighting the Sunni-dominated insurgency and on recruiting and training Iraqi security forces.

"The American politicians couldn't understand the deepness and complications of the region," said Falah al-Nakib, the interior minister from June 2004 to April 2005, who said he raised the militia problem and the growing Iranian influence in Iraq with U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld. "They didn't take us seriously."

http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/news/nation/14364011.htm

[MrModerate]

1. Simpleminded, shallow policymakers . . .

Without the patience or professionalism to test their easy answers against more sophisticated judgments . . . often dance with glee when they take a pawn in the second move, never realizing that the rest of the game is still ahead of them.

[Supersedeas]

2. wonder what category Condi puts this into?

[wellst0nev0ter]

3. Bullshit. They Didn't Ignore Them, They MADE Them.

Salvador Option anyone?

[Barrett808]

4. Precisely. The militias were *invited* into the military and police

It wasn't even "infiltration." So when you see x hundred thousand "Iraqi forces," a good percentage, maybe even the lion's share, comprises militias.