[angaq0k]

From this site: http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/Con...d=968332188492

Iraqis united in their fury toward U.S.

HAROON SIDDIQUI
TORONTO STAR

Set aside the arguments over how George W. Bush invaded Iraq under false pretences. Forget the mirage of the weapons of mass destruction and the missing link between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein. Ignore the inconsistency of toppling one dictator but sparing others.

On the first anniversary of the American occupation, concentrate instead on what is happening in Iraq — the resistance, the spreading terrorism and the presumed imminence of a civil war between religious, ethnic and tribal factions.

What does the future hold for Iraq's 25 million people and, by extension, all Arabs and indeed the larger Muslim world of 1.3 billion, especially their toxic relationship with America?

The answers lie partly in the response to another question, the one American soldiers in Iraq often ask, when not sitting in armoured vehicles with machine guns pointing outward: "Why do they hate us?"

(...)

The final word goes to Margaret MacMillan, University of Toronto historian and author of Paris 1919, an account of the Paris peace talks after World War I. Asked what should America have learned but didn't from the 1920 Iraqi rebellion against the British occupation, she said:

"You can do a lot with great military power but you can't get people to behave the way you want them to. For that, you need persuasion."

I thought that article is of great interest. On a side note, Margaret MacMillan is the grand-daughter of Lloyd, the British prime minister at the time of the talks of Paris, 1919. Apparently an excellent book as well.