USA geben irakischen Traum verloren

--- Das wird die Neokonservativen aber gar nicht freuen (s. Links in der Nachrichtenschau von gestern): Wie die Washington Post schreibt, hat sich die US-Regierung weitgehend von ihrem Traum verabschiedet, den Irak zu einer westlichen Vorzeigedemokratie umzumodeln:

The Bush administration is significantly lowering expectations of what can be achieved in Iraq, recognizing that the United States will have to settle for far less progress than originally envisioned during the transition due to end in four months, according to U.S. officials in Washington and Baghdad. The United States no longer expects to see a model new democracy, a self-supporting oil industry or a society in which the majority of people are free from serious security or economic challenges, U.S. officials say. "What we expected to achieve was never realistic given the timetable or what unfolded on the ground," said a senior official involved in policy since the 2003 invasion. "We are in a process of absorbing the factors of the situation we're in and shedding the unreality that dominated at the beginning." ... The ferocious debate over a new constitution has particularly driven home the gap between the original U.S. goals and the realities after almost 28 months. ... But whatever the outcome on specific disputes, the document on which Iraq's future is to be built will require laws to be compliant with Islam. Kurds and Shiites are expecting de facto long-term political privileges. And women's rights will not be as firmly entrenched as Washington has tried to insist, U.S. officials and Iraq analysts say. "We set out to establish a democracy, but we're slowly realizing we will have some form of Islamic republic," said another U.S. official familiar with policymaking from the beginning, who like some others interviewed would speak candidly only on the condition of anonymity. "That process is being repeated all over." ... Killings of members of the Iraqi security force have tripled since January. Iraq's ministry of health estimates that bombings and other attacks have killed 4,000 civilians in Baghdad since Prime Minister Ibrahim Jafari's interim government took office April 28. Last week was the fourth-worst week of the whole war for U.S. military deaths in combat, and August already is the worst month for deaths of members of the National Guard and Reserve. ... Washington now does not expect to fully defeat the insurgency before departing, but instead to diminish it, officials and analysts said. ... "The most thoroughly dashed expectation was the ability to build a robust self-sustaining economy. We're nowhere near that. State industries, electricity are all below what they were before we got there," said Wayne White, former head of the State Department's Iraq intelligence team who is now at the Middle East Institute. "The administration says Saddam ran down the country. But most damage was from looting [after the invasion], which took down state industries, large private manufacturing, the national electric" system.

Mehr als eine Verschlimmbesserung scheint bei dem Irak-Abenteuer Bushs also nicht mehr herauszukommen, wenn man optimistisch bleibt.

Und sonst: Nur immer neue Waffentechnik ist eben auch nicht das Wundermittel: Bitte noch kleiner! Die Darpa will eine Mini-Drohne entwickeln, die kleiner als 5 cm ist, aber sucht auch nach neuen (Wunder)Techniken für den Stadtkampf.

Bei Done with Mirrors werden die US-Propagandamethoden von heute mit Klassikern aus dem 2. Weltkrieg verglichen.

Es menschelt gar sehr bei Gerd im Wahlkampf: Daheim bei Schröders: Handy nein, Pantoffeln ja.

Neu- und Alt-Frustrierte unter sich -- das kann ja heiter werden beim etwas anderen Duell der Spitzen: Stoiber und Lafontaine vereinbaren Rede-Duell.

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