I'm afraid they're right about that.
You are not getting it, are you? 'They' don't give a stuff whether or not you connect the dots - that's totally irrelevant to them. Their primary aim is to get the Americans out, and this is one strategy which *will* work. If you don't understand why it will work then you don't understand either the nature of insurgency or of politics in the Middle East.
And this is why the Americans should never have embarked on such a foolish enterprise right from the start. It's not a question of 'right' or 'wrong', as these are subjective - it's a question of strategy, and the 'militants' are on a winner with this one, because they know - and the Americans apparently don't - that every civilian end in Iraq will be blamed on the American presence. Every civilian end adds to the demand from inside Iraq to get the Americans to leave them to sort it out themselves.
If there was one lesson that Vietnam taught an earlier generation of Americans, it was exactly this one.
You don't like it? Stiff. Neither do most of us, but it's a fact.
Rifty -- Academic and Computing Help
