{"id":2102,"date":"2005-01-04T16:31:00","date_gmt":"2005-01-04T20:31:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.meehawl.com\/Blogfiles-wp\/?p=2102"},"modified":"2005-01-04T16:31:00","modified_gmt":"2005-01-04T20:31:00","slug":"into-the-abyss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.meehawl.com\/Blogfiles\/2005\/01\/04\/16\/31\/into-the-abyss\/","title":{"rendered":"Into the Abyss"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Insurgents assassinated the highest-ranking Iraqi official in eight months Tuesday, gunning down the governor of Baghdad province and six of his bodyguards, and a suicide truck bomber killed 10 people at an Interior Ministry commando headquarters.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/a>I hate to be proved right but things are looking increasingly bleak in Iraq. The resistance to US occupation is morphing into a full-fledged civil war, while the impotent puppet regime suffers the ignominy of watching its leaders struck down one by one with seeming effortless ease. Most of the Sunni areas of Iraq are ungovernable and in a state of armed insurrection or military subjugation while Sunni political leaders have already pledged to boycott the forthcoming elections.<\/p>\n

This leaves the Sistani-influenced Shia parties free to sweep the polls in January. The weakening US occupation forces must look on in baffled bemusement as an Iran-aligned popular front bides its time, conserves its strength, and restrains its militias from open resistance. Meanwhile the northern Kurdish factions have already basically opted out of a united Iraq, and still refuse to disarm. Whichever regime takes “power” in southern Iraq — be in the Islamist Shia parties or a new hasty US-appointed rainbow coalition of vaguely popular forces — will face the refusal by over two-thirds of of Iraq to accept its putative legitimacy or instruments of governance.<\/p>\n

In this environment a continued regression towards autarchy or theocracy seems inevitable.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Insurgents assassinated the highest-ranking Iraqi official in eight months Tuesday, gunning down the governor of Baghdad province and six of his bodyguards, and a suicide truck bomber killed 10 people at an Interior Ministry...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2102","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t