Can Iraq survive on it's own (against the insurgents) with out the US standing by it's side?

Having deeply analyzed all possible endings to this conflict the following result is most likely to occur..........

When the US pulls out, whether its in 9 weeks, 9 months, 9 years, or 90 years, a Shia General in the new Iraqi Army will take control of all of Iraq and brutally suppress all who oppose him.

So what has the United States done? They traded a Sunni dictator for Shia dictator and killed 3400+ and wounded over 25,000(and counting.........) young Americans for absolutely nothing. The only winners of this of this war are oil men (like George Bush) and people connected to defense contractors such as Halliburton (like Dick Cheney.) I will never understand how this pair has not been at least been impeached by the U.S. House so they can answer for the wreckless behavior in this conflict of interest.

Now to answer your question. Yes. Iraq will be just fine with an another dictator in Baghdad. If you do your research, you will find that there was almost a coup about a year ago involving Shia generals while the US is still on the ground there. The US caught wind of it and suppressed it and kept it mostly out of the press. Next time the Shia coup will be attempted is when America pulls out and will no longer be able to stop it.

What will the coup mean for the Iraqi people? Once the dictator and siezes control and eliminates all oppostion, the Iraqi people will be able to wake up in the morning and not wonder whether they are going to be blown up or not. It will actually be a welcome stabilizing effect. Terrorism will cease because the Shia dictator will exterminate them and those he thinks are associated with them without hessitation or impunity. The Shia dictator will succeed because he will be ruthless. The United States government actually punishes its own soldiers and puts them in prison for acts against insurgents. Meanwhile, insurgents who kill the Americans are treated easily and let go in many cases. The US Soldiers over there are too scared to do their job for fear of their own US government reprisal. The American units in Iraq are told, "you can't do this, and you can't do that, and you can't do this", while Iraq crumbles into chaos. Its not a war, its an insurgent turkey shoot. Troop Surge? Notice the only thing surging is the number of American soldiers dying per day. More targets for the insurgent turkey shoot.

Iraq will be just fine and will probably prosper and become one of the powerful countries in the Middle East once the USA gets out.

70% of Americans want the US out of Iraq. The Republicans don't get it and they will all be voted out of office in 2008. This quagmire will pave the way for possibly the first woman President in United States history. If she can stop the war and bring down the price of gas, bring her on.

If the USA pulled out of Iraq then all hell will break out. Iran will be supporting the Shites fundamentalists. The Sunnis would seek support from Saudi Arabia and Jordan. And all of them would fight the Kurds. The Iraqi government would only last about two weeks.

The end result would probably be about a million deaths and the new government would be Shite fundamentalists in league with Iran.

Probably not. The bullies in the region know that they have the American people on the run and if they can get the US voters to force the military out of there they can over run the people who are trying to build a country there. Man, I am in awe of the courage of the Iraqi people who are standing up to blind, viscious violence in an attempt to make a place where people can not be slaughtered by clerics and suicde bombers. People of intelligence and skill who are trying to make a workable government are targeted every day by the ugliest, most evil people on earth. And yet they are standing up. They are much braver than we are. No one could ever convince me that Americans (of today) could ever stand up like that to violence. Our military is tops but our people are whimps and the bullies know that if they can target enough Americans there they can get the whimps to withdraw and leave the Iraqi middle class, academics and doctors to be murdered and they can take the country back to the stone age. Too bad we are not the people of the "greatest generation" that fought WWII, they would have already wrapped that up.

a majority believe that the surge of US troops in Anbar and Baghdad will worsen security (49%) or have no effect (22%) -Poll of 2,212 people conducted from 25 February to 5 March 2007, in all 18 provinces [in Iraq].

Nationally a small majority (53%) felt that the security situation in Iraq will get better in the immediate weeks following a withdrawal of the MNF. A quarter (26%) believes the situation will deteriorate with the remainder predicting no change or answering "Don't know." - Opinion poll of 5019 adults in every governorate of Iraq conducted from 10-22 February 2007.

"95 per cent of respondents believe the security situation has deteriorated since the arrival of US forces

Nearly 66 per cent of respondents thought violence would decrease if US forces were to leave

Thirty-eight per cent were also "unconfident" that Nuri al-Maliki, the Iraqi prime minister, would be able to improve the situation in Iraq and nearly 90 per cent described the government's implementation of its commitments and promises as very poor

36.5 per cent said they felt the official security forces were unable to keep control in the country"

- Nov 2006 poll of 2000 people in Baghdad, Anbar and Najaf by the Iraq Centre for Research and Strategic Studies

"The United States needs a new strategy in Iraq and the Persian Gulf. The war is at best a stalemate; the large American presence now causes more trouble than it prevents. We must disengage from Iraq—and we must do it by removing most American and allied military units within 18 months. Though disengagement has risks and costs, they can be managed. The consequences would not be worse for the United States than the present situation, and capabilities for dealing with them are impressive, if properly employed. [...]"

"[T]he expectation of an open-ended American presence lends internal and external political support to the insurgents and infantilizes the government and army of Iraq, producing at best a perpetual stalemate ... The United States must try another strategy while it still has the political and military resources necessary to influence the pattern of disengagement and the aftermath. " Barry Posen, International Professor of Political Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology http://www.bostonreview.net/BR31.1/posen.html

"Summary: The best strategy for the United States now in Iraq is disengagement. In a reversal of the usual sequence, the U.S. hand will be strengthened by withdrawal, and Washington might actually be able to lay the groundwork for a reasonably stable Iraq. Why? Because geography ensures that all other parties are far more exposed to the dangers of an anarchical Iraq than is the United States itself." - 'Iraq: The Logic of Disengagement' (Feb 2005) by Edward N. Luttwak in Foreign Affairs

"Though the Bush administration has framed the intervention in Iraq as a means of fighting terrorism, all around the world - including in the US - most people view it as having increased the likelihood of terrorist attacks," Pipa director Steven Kull notes. "The near-unanimity of this assessment among countries is remarkable in global public opinion polling." - Poll by BBC World Service, Pipa, GlobeScan (28 Feb 2006)

More Iraq polls can be found here:

http://www.iraqanalysis.org/info/55

I read the posts and most think the USA is the bad guy. I find it interesting that so many Americans are so shallow minded that they think it is a local Iraq population problem. Listen to the world--it is a Islam problam. They want you dead! Iran, Saudi, Egypt, Afgan, Irag, Chet, the list is a 100 miles long of the countries that want you dead. The US pulling out will just make it faster to when they come to your door again!! USMC 60-68

I think that Iraqu is very unstable and eventualy tropps will be able to pull out, but at this point in time i think if we pull out of Iraq, then it would mostly likely cause a collapse of everythin that is either stale or stablizing, which would ruin all of our time there. it would also effect in a possible Civil War there. If this happend then we would be blamed and our terrorist rate would climb dramatically. Not only the original group of terrorists but new groups that were becoming allies will decide to turn against us. Iraq is in a very fragile state and we need to fund our soldiers and keep enough there that they can still stableize iraq till its close enough to stablization to pull them out.

Did the United States survive its civil war? Yes

Iraq must and will continue to go through this bloody process to re-establish some order to the current chaos. The process will continue with or without the presence of U.S. forces as occupying referee. The situation will stabilize, eventually.

We will find out in the near future. I hope the Kurds can keep their prosperity and freedom at least. Not sure why world leaders think they need to hold a country together when maybe it can split up peacefully like much of The USSR did.

http://www.yaktivist.com/

Polite Discussion, Respectful Disagreements regarding nonlethal alternatives to Abortion, Death Penalty, Lethal Weapons.

I agree with Greatful Dead, no insurgency survives and excels without the backing of the general population.

We're like a dumb boyfriend who's girlfriend keeps cheating on him. We're too weak to admit the truth to ourselves that we're trying to protect a lying whore.

What do you mean "against the insurgents"??? The insurgency is only successful because the population sustains and supports it. The insurgents wouldnt be able to do anything if they couldnt melt back into the population after doing an attack. The insurgents rely on the population to support them and help them carry out their attacks.

80% of Iraqis want us out of Iraq, and near 70% now think its OK to kill American soldiers. What in God's name are we still there for? Never mind the fact that we should never have gone in, they want us out and we should respect them and what they want. Its no wonder they support people who kill our troops, we're occupying their country and we're doing more harm than good by being there.