CIA Said Instability in Iraq Seemed 'Irreversible'

[cal04]

Source: Washington Post

Early on the morning of Nov. 13, 2006, members of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group gathered around a dark wooden conference table in the windowless Roosevelt Room of the White House.

For more than an hour, they listened to President Bush give what one panel member called a "Churchillian" vision of "victory" in Iraq and defend the country's prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki. "A constitutional order is emerging," he said.

Two hours later, around the same conference table, CIA Director Michael V. Hayden painted a starkly different picture for members of the study group. Hayden said "the inability of the government to govern seems irreversible," adding that he could not "point to any milestone or checkpoint where we can turn this thing around," according to written records of his briefing and the recollections of six participants.

"The government is unable to govern," Hayden concluded. "We have spent a lot of energy and treasure creating a government that is balanced, and it cannot function."

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/11/AR2007071102451.html?hpid=topnews

[kurth]

1. The second law of thermodynamics

aka The cat is out of the bag.

Just get the fuck out.

[Strelnikov_]

2. "and, lastly, al-Qaeda"

Hayden catalogued what he saw as the main sources of violence in this order: the insurgency, sectarian strife, criminality, general anarchy and, lastly, al-Qaeda.

Though Hayden had listed al-Qaeda as the fifth most pressing threat in Iraq, Bush regularly lists al-Qaeda first.

[EVDebs]

3. Britain's 1920's experience and Iraq-nam were always known as the outcome

Now WashPost makes it look like Gomer Pyle saying 'sue-prize sue-prize sue-prize Sgt. Carter, looky what we have here, an Iraq sityouatshun that looks like cowpoop'

The CIA ain't that dumb.

[phildo]

4. Sort of have to admire Negroponte's work

Who knew that sponsoring death squads on both sides would work out this well?

Now we will have cause to be around there as long as the oil.

[Usrename]

5. It's sort of a trademark of his. Of course he does it well.

Welcome to DU phildo!

[The Backlash Cometh]

6. Wasn't the CIA in the business of destabilizing countries?

Well, if Cheney and Rumsfeld are old guard, well done, boys. Mission Accomplished.