I've long said that the upcoming celebration next week for the referendum will be short lived, and promoted largely by the American right wing. After this, things will remain the same in Iraq; a state in regression, moving towards a civil war or worse a regional sectarian war. Long-time Mid-East correspondent Robert Fisk notes that we (the west) may be the only people seriously talking about the referendum when you take into account the chaos in some parts of Iraq as he reflected over multiple visits to the country.

...the portrayal of Iraq by Western leaders of efforts to introduce democracy, including Saturday's national vote on the country's proposed constitution was "unreal" to most of its citizens. In Baghdad, children and women were kept at home to prevent them from being kidnapped for money or sold into slavery. They faced a desperate struggle to find the money to keep generators running to provide themselves with electricity. "They aren't sitting in their front rooms discussing the referendum on the constitution."

I hope that this vote will lead to some progress, but I'm not counting on it; if you can't take it anymore and you have to see good news from Iraq just watch Fox next week and believe them. Then just ignore the real news as it comes out from actual reporters and specialists. It's what half the country has been doing for the entire war so far...

Another highlight form Fisk (as written by Nigel Morris)

Fisk doubted the sincerity of Western leaders' commitment to bringing democracy to Iraq and said a lasting settlement in the country was impossible while foreign troops remained. "In the Middle East, they would like some of our democracy, they would like a couple of boxes off the supermarket shelves of human rights as well. But I think they would also like freedom from us."

...

He told the debate in London: "The Americans must leave Iraq and they will leave Iraq, but they can't leave Iraq and that is the equation that turns sand to blood. At some point, they will have to talk to the insurgents."

"But I don't know how, because those people who might be negotiators the United Nations, the Red Cross their headquarters have been blown up. The reality now in Iraq is the project is finished. Most of Iraq, except Kurdistan, is in a state of anarchy."

This was all predicted by the CIA before the war but marginalized by the greedy and vendictive nature of the administration and its neocon advisors. Funny isn't it? Maybe if some of the decision makers had some merit to make decisions like waging a war on Iraq we would be talking in a much different tone today :(

"Intelligence assessments on post-Saddam issues were particularly insightful," said the report.

...

"In an ironic twist, the policy community was receptive to technical intelligence (the weapons program) where the analysis was wrong, but apparently paid little attention to intelligence on cultural and political issues (post-Saddam Iraq), where the analysis was right."

Where was the candy and flowers?

The Bush administration suggested early in the Iraq war that American forces would be greeted as liberators by a grateful Iraqi people. President George W. Bush initially took a cavalier approach to the insurgency, suggesting it would be no threat to U.S. forces there and declaring: "Bring 'em on!"

But more than two years later the country is gripped by a deadly Sunni Arab insurgency against the Shi'ite and Kurdish-led government and U.S. troops and nearly 2,000 U.S. troops have been killed.

Presented in July 2004, the report said prewar Iraq intelligence also concluded accurately that Saddam had no operational or collaborative ties with al Qaeda and calculated the war's impact on oil markets.

The CIA report, produced by a team led by former CIA Deputy Director Richard Kerr, was issued as the last in a series of three reports on Iraq intelligence. It is unclassified but has not been released publicly until now. The two earlier reports remain classified.

Oh how I'd like to see those reports, so often in America truth comes with time. Some people should not forget that.

Posted by Geoff