Iraqi attitudes to US troops

[Faithless]

Nearly half approve of what?

Fucking attacks on US-led forces. Thanks for nothin'. :frown:

Actually, there are a few different stats going on, but the one that gets the headline is the attack thing.

Nearly half of Iraqis support attacks on U.S. troops, poll finds (http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/politics/13750080.htm)

Posted on Mon, Jan. 30, 2006 | BY DREW BROWN | Knight Ridder Newspapers

WASHINGTON - A new poll found that nearly half of Iraqis approve of attacks on U.S.-led forces, and most favor setting a timetable for American troops to leave.

The poll also found that 80 percent of Iraqis think the United States plans to maintain permanent bases in the country even if the newly elected Iraqi government asks American forces to leave. Researchers found a link between support for attacks and the belief among Iraqis that the United States intends to keep a permanent military presence in the country.

At the same time, the poll found that many Iraqis think that some outside military forces are required to keep Iraq stable until the new government can field adequate security forces on its own. Only 39 percent of Iraqis surveyed thought that Iraqi police and army forces were strong enough to deal with the security challenges on their own, while 59 percent thought Iraq still needed the help of military forces from other countries.

Seventy percent of Iraqis favor setting a timetable for U.S. forces to withdraw, with half of those favoring a withdrawal within six months and the other half favoring a withdrawal over two years.

"Iraqis are demanding a timetable for U.S. withdrawal, and most believe that the U.S. has no plans to leave even if the new government asks them to," said Steven Kull, the director of the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland, which conducted the poll. "This appears to be leading some to even support attacks on U.S.-led troops, even though many feel they also continue to need the presence of U.S. troops awhile longer."

"If you put it all together, it's clear there is a center of gravity, not towards immediate withdrawal, but for the U.S. to be there in a way that affirms their intent to withdraw eventually," he said. "There is real consensus on that point."

The poll was to be published Tuesday by WorldPublicOpinion.org, a Web site that reports on public opinion from around the globe. The survey was conducted Jan. 2-5, with a nationwide sample of 1,150 Iraqis from country's main religious and ethnic sects.

According to the poll's findings, 47 percent of Iraqis approve of attacks on American forces, but there were large differences among ethnic and religious groups. Among Sunni Muslims, 88 percent said they approved of the attacks. That approval was found among 41 percent of Shiite Muslims and 16 percent of Kurds.

Ninety-three percent of Iraqis oppose violence against Iraqi security forces, and 99 percent oppose attacks on Iraqi civilians.

"They're pretty much the same results that have been going on since 2003, so it's consistent with a lot of the attitudes that exist," said Anthony H. Cordesman, a former Pentagon official and a longtime Iraq watcher at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a center for national-security studies in Washington. "We're not seen as liberators by the Sunnis, but what else is new?"

Previous samples from Shiites who supported attacks on coalition troops have been much lower in the past, Cordesman said, but support for U.S.-led forces even among Shiites - who were oppressed under Saddam Hussein, a Sunni - has been mixed from the beginning.

"It was clear after the invasion that about a third or more of Shiites did not see us as liberators, and did not see the war as justified, and somewhere around 15 percent supported attacks on coalition forces then," he said. "We're also seen as creating all kinds of internal problems without creating any kind of internal solutions."

U.S. officials have acknowledged in the past that the mere presence of American troops in Iraq has helped fuel the insurgency, which is dominated by Iraq's Sunni minority. U.S. officials have sent mixed signals about long-term American intentions.

During a visit with U.S. troops in Fallujah on Christmas Day, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said "at the moment there are no plans for permanent bases" in Iraq. "It is a subject that has not even been discussed with the Iraqi government," he said.

According to the poll, 80 percent of Iraqis overall assume that the United States intends to keep bases in Iraq. The breakdown of people who have that belief is 92 percent of Sunnis, 79 percent of Shiites and 67 percent of Kurds.

More than 80 percent of Sunnis favor a six-month withdrawal period; 49 percent of Shiites favor a longer withdrawal. Just 29 percent of all Iraqis surveyed say U.S. forces should be reduced only as the security situation improves, though more than half of the Kurds surveyed favor that option.

The survey will be available at www.worldpublicopinion.org

[Player 0]

Well of course the US will maintain a military pressence in Iraq, it's all apart of the big game of politics, they do it to maintain US control and influence there, just like they do in Asia and Europe.

[Chad]

Ninety-three percent of Iraqis oppose violence against Iraqi security forces, and 99 percent oppose attacks on Iraqi civilians.
1% approve of attacks on Iraqi civilians? what the hell? i guess they included al-qaeda members in this poll.

[Faithless]

The Haditha attrocities, if not dealt with properly, could turn more and more Iraqis against America and its so-called "efforts" there.

Now, amid charges of violence by US troops against Iraqi civilians, including an alleged massacre in the Sunni village of Haditha, elected Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is showing no such reticence. A critic of the US occupation before taking office, he has charged that such violence by coalition forces is a "daily phenomenon" and "a terrible crime," and demanded that the US turn over to Iraqis information on the Haditha case.

Iraq's tougher stance toward US -- The prime minister takes a hard line on the Haditha case - which may complicate US relations. (http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0607/p01s03-usfp.html)

By Howard LaFranchi | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

WASHINGTON – The Abu Ghraib prison scandal was a contentious topic when Iyad Allawi became Iraq's interim prime minister in June 2004. But Mr. Allawi, appointed by the occupying power, resisted domestic pressure to conduct an Iraqi investigation.

Now, amid charges of violence by US troops against Iraqi civilians, including an alleged massacre in the Sunni village of Haditha, elected Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is showing no such reticence. A critic of the US occupation before taking office, he has charged that such violence by coalition forces is a "daily phenomenon" and "a terrible crime," and demanded that the US turn over to Iraqis information on the Haditha case.

Mr. Maliki's tough stance suggests a new assertion of sovereignty by the Iraqi government, something that actually works to the US's favor. But the allegations, coming as the new government tries to demonstrate control, are likely to complicate both US-Iraq relations and Maliki's task of leading the Iraqi people.

Already, some Sunni religious and political leaders, in particular, are criticizing Maliki, a Shiite, for not being strong enough with the Americans. If his response falls short in their eyes, political relations with the minority Sunni population, already fragile, could become more difficult - and anti-American sentiment could intensify.

"Maliki is being hammered by the Sunnis. He has to worry about the rising fortunes of people like [radical Shiite cleric Moqtada] al-Sadr. So he needs to be able to show some sovereignty," says Iraq expert Henri Barkey, a former State Department analyst now at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pa. "The trick for the US is to boost this guy, because there may not be another one after him."

A year ago, a minority of members in Iraq's interim national assembly sought a timetable for US troop withdrawal. In the new parliament, Mr. Sadr's supporters are even stronger. That, coupled with the parliamentary presence of a Sunni bloc, has added to pressure for a US withdrawal.

Maliki has a "soft spot" for that viewpoint, says one Iraqi former official who refused to be named because of the sensitive nature of US-Iraq relations. But the prime minister also knows he needs US troops to cope with a worsening security situation in Baghdad and other areas of Iraq, the former official says. As a result, Maliki is likely to seek compromise measures short of withdrawal - including establishing zones that are off limits to US troops and requiring joint US-Iraqi patrols - to try to placate public concerns.

Incidents like the one alleged in Haditha, which can feed Iraqi resentment about living in insecurity, only make Maliki's task harder, some experts say.

"Incidents like Haditha have the effect of widening the gap further between the people and the government, because they leave them feeling like they are totally on their own," says Juan Cole, an Iraq expert at the University of Michigan. Iraqis see their new elected officials operating from inside Baghdad's fortified Green Zone, he says, while they remain "outside" in the crossfire of a counterinsurgency battle and a "civil war."

In that environment, threats to civilians are not uniquely or primarily from US forces. Just this week, more than 50 civilians were kidnapped midday just north of the Green Zone. A Sunni political group accused militias associated with the Shiite-controlled Interior Ministry of carrying out the operation.

On Tuesday, Maliki pledged to implement a new security plan for Baghdad that he said will address mounting sectarian and militia-generated violence.

With such worries, Maliki can't be too tough with the Americans, Mr. Cole says. "The government is in a difficult position because it's not able to tell the Americans to leave or what to do, but at the same time it needs to mollify a public that accuses it of letting American troops operate around the country marauding at will."

Simply "demanding the Haditha file" from the US "is a symbolic gesture that only reveals his dependence on the American side," Cole says. What could begin to remedy that is a formal status of forces agreement, or SOFA, between the US and Iraq that would lay out the functions and limits of US forces, he adds.

"The problem is they have what is essentially a hung parliament" - unable to fill the key defense and interior minister positions - "and that hardly puts them in a position to demand a SOFA," Cole says.

If the Iraqi public comes to see its government as weak or atrophied, that would spell trouble ahead, especially as officials begin to tackle major constitutional issues.

Divisive matters - including the formation of autonomous regions, the dividing of oil revenues, and the status of the northern oil-rich hub of Kirkuk - are slated to be settled by the end of the year. Resolving them was supposed to be facilitated by the inclusion of Sunnis in the new parliament and government, but mounting Sunni criticism of Maliki is just one indication of how difficult progress will be to achieve.

For one thing, Maliki - and his US backers - are discovering that the proudly proclaimed "national unity government" that represents all major population groups may actually be more unwieldy and less able to act.

In a recent report, Iraq expert Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies notes: "Rising participation did not reflect acceptance of the new government or political process, it reflected a steady sharpening of political division along sectarian and ethnic lines."

Some experts calculate that Maliki has fewer than 120 supporters in a 275-seat parliament. "If the Maliki government does not make real headway on security and the constitutional issues," says the former Iraqi official, "then it could go down."

[TheABC]

Of course Iraqis are going to be cheesed off, nobody asked America to be world police!

Keep in mind that everybody is frustrated at the wrong people, and I mean everybody. Some Iraqis hate US troops when they should hate the US government, some US troops hate Iraqis when they should also hate the US government which sent them to war for no good reason. As for everybody outside the combat zone, they play their little games. The warmongerers set about warmongering, and the middle class suburban white kids think AK-47's are the shit and that they are rebellious because they have Che on their shirts. Everyone is pissing with their eyes closed and missing.