by Pepe Escobar

Asia Times

11/20/04

For the average Iraqi, Sunni or Shi'ite -- and Americans underestimate Iraqi national pride at their peril -- there's no question: the current Sunni resistance morally prevails, because they are Iraqis fighting an invader/occupier. This means the US occupation in essence lost even before it began. Defining the resistance as 'anti-Iraqi forces' -- as the Pentagon does -- is nonsense: they are a legitimate popular resistance movement, while the US-trained Iraqi police are largely identified for what they are -- collaborationists doing the dirty work of Iraqification, the Mesopotamian version of failed Vietnamization. Hundreds of these US-trained forces ran away before the battle even started in Fallujah. No wonder: they were resistance moles. And most of Mosul's police also defected...

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/FK20Ak03.html


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp