I get a sick feeling they're making it up as they go along. And how does planning for a civil war equate with fantasies of progress?
U.S. Sets Plans to Aid Iraq in Civil War
Security Forces Would Bear BruntBy Ann Scott Tyson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, March 10, 2006; Page A01
The U.S. military will rely primarily on Iraq's security forces to put down a civil war in that country if one breaks out, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld told lawmakers yesterday.
Sectarian violence in Iraq has reached a level unprecedented since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003 and is now eclipsing the insurgency as the chief security threat there, said Army Gen. John P. Abizaid, the top U.S. commander in the Middle East, who appeared with Rumsfeld.
If civil war becomes reality, "it's very clear that the Iraqi forces will handle it, but they'll handle it with our help," Abizaid said later when asked to elaborate on Rumsfeld's remark.
The sobering assessment of sectarian tensions in Iraq shows the extent to which the Feb. 22 bombing of a holy Shiite shrine, and the ensuing revenge attacks that left hundreds of Sunni and Shiite Muslims dead, has shifted military calculations on a range of fronts, including what constitutes the top security challenge and prospects for further reductions in U.S. troop levels this year.
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