MORE ON "LAST THROES"

Decisive victory doubtful in Iraq
Military: Diplomacy is only path to peace
Bryan Bender
Boston Globe
Jun. 11, 2005 12:00 AM
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/news/articles/0611iraq-assess11.html



WASHINGTON - Military operations in Iraq have not succeeded in weakening the insurgency, and Iraq's government, with U.S. support, is now seeking a political reconciliation among the nation's ethnic and tribal factions as the only viable route to stability, according to U.S. military officials and private specialists.

Pentagon officials and current members of the military interviewed for this story spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Vice President Dick Cheney, who said on May 31 that the insurgency was in its ''last throes," took many U.S. officials and analysts by surprise, Pentagon officials and others with extensive knowledge of the war said in a series of interviews. The available data, they said, simply do not support such a claim.

New U.S. government analyses suggest that the insurgents, which are led by Sunni nationalists, remnants of Saddam's police state, and foreign extremists waging holy war, have vastly more staying power than previously thought.

An internal Army report in April said that rather than what some saw as a drop in the number of daily attacks earlier this year, the insurgents had simply shifted their focus away from U.S. forces to attacks on more vulnerable targets, which were not being fully tallied at the time.

A major reason why the insurgency has remained so undeterred, U.S. and Iraqi officials believe, is the continued if passive support it is receiving from large parts of Iraq's Sunni minority. Meanwhile, a recent internal poll conducted for the U.S.-led coalition indicated that nearly 45 percent of the Iraqi population supports the insurgent attacks, making accurate intelligence difficult to obtain. Only 15 percent of those polled said they strongly support the U.S.-led coalition.