WP: Twists Make Predictions A Dubious Bet In Iraq War

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A49370-2005Mar19?language=printer

Last fall, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld predicted a "process or tipping" in Iraq in which citizens there would become fed up with the murder and mayhem of extremists, and eventually turn to embrace democracy. His remark drew from the currently fashionable notion of "tipping points" to describe how major shifts occur in society and elsewhere.

Last month, Rumsfeld said the Jan. 30 election in Iraq had demonstrated a "tipping" of support away from the insurgency and toward the new Iraqi government.

But last week, the Pentagon leader was careful to hedge his judgment of Iraqi developments so far, speaking more in terms of ebbs and flows than decisive movement in a single direction.

"You start predicting that this is a turning point; the next thing you find is the turning point back the other way," Rumsfeld told NBC News. "It is not a straight path."

Two years after the invasion, Rumsfeld's caution reflects complicated realities in Iraq, where the overall picture for the U.S. military remains very mixed, according to administration officials, military commanders and independent experts.

[davhill]

1. The only "tipping point" was the invasion itself

Everything else since is the US trying to unbreak an egg.

[LynnTheDem]

2. US Military report, March 2005; US could lose the war.

http://216.26.163.62/2005/ss_iraq_03_07.html

Yeah I'd say it's way beyond time Rumsfeld and the rest of the bushCartel realize every time they've opened their mouths they've been proven wrong, wrong, wrong, and dead-wrong.

[teryang]

3. The success with globalism has led them to believe

...that naked colonial conquest would do well in the new world order.

This is a head in the sand approach to the import of the last 100 years of world history. Colonialism is dead period. It has zero chance of success. It is being forced upon the weak and helpless in Haiti in an overt fashion. In a desperately weak and oppressed place such as this with no access to resources perhaps the people can be victimized indefinitely because the disparity of power is about as pronounced as it can get. However, Iraq is not isolated, its human and physical resources are great, and they are not isolated from sympathetic Asian neighbors. Therefore, they cannot be subdued.