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Sunday, July 23, 2006

Iraq - Civil War to end all Uncivil Wars


In the spirit of calling a spade a spade, Nicholas Sambanis, in the New York Times, seems to have bucked the trend in the media. He describes the nature of the so called democratic process in Iraq, including murder, mayhem, civilian death and other not so pleasant aspects such as roadside bombs, assassinations and suicide bombs, as a civil war, not an insurgency as our friends in the Dubya friendly media and their enablers like to put it.

According to Sambanis, civil wars are defined as armed conflicts between the government of a sovereign state and domestic political groups mounting effective resistance in relatively continuous fighting that causes high numbers of deaths (over 100 per day in June). This broad definition does not always distinguish civil wars from other forms of political violence, so we often use somewhat arbitrary criteria, like different thresholds of annual deaths, to sort out cases. Depending on the criteria used, there have been about 100 to 150 civil wars since 1945. Iraq is clearly one of them.

Seems pretty clear to me and most people outside of Dubyaland. The most common resolution, according to Mr. Sambanis, is a decisive victory. I think that is about as likely as Carlton winning the AFL Grand Final this year or Sandra Kanck becoming Prime Minister next year.

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