Reconciliation

Iraqi Reconciliation

18 January 2007 | Domestic Policy

The carnage in Iraq is continuing without lessening. The slaughter has neither direction nor meaning. No one can even name what is happening: is it a civil war? Resistance? Sectarian violence? Insurgency? A proxy war? Now both Americans and Iraqi leaders admit they cannot control the situation. The new Bush plan to send 21,500 new American troops to Baghdad is unlikely to stop the bloodshed. It will only increase the suspicion that Americans have no intentions of leaving Iraq or giving a timetable for withdrawal. In turn, this will only further weaken the already weak Maliki government, which is in the process of forming a new cabinet.