I can't help but wonder if after they hang Sadam, things will quite down...I get the feeling that he is stiring the pot there, don't know how, but I feel that.
The people elected this guy and I think they will stand behind him in the end of things....once they start taking more and more of the controlling in their country, and the more we fade out, I think the citizens there will even run out the insurgents...
I see good things coming along for this new country and I hope the rats dont ruin it for them....God knows President Bush is trying as hard as he can to help them....
I'm Wolf Blitzer. You're in THE SITUATION ROOM.
The top U.S. military intelligence officer has a very sobering assessment of the cycle of violence in Iraq which is killing thousands of civilians each month. He now says the carnage could go on for decades. He spoke exclusively to our Pentagon correspondent, Barbara Starr.
She's at the U.S. Central Command headquarters at an undisclosed location in the Middle East -- Barbara.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, as we continue to travel throughout this region with General John Abizaid, an inside look at the latest intelligence assessment on Iraq.
(voice-over): As the Bush administration struggles to find a way out of Iraq, the top U.S. military intelligence officer for the region says sectarian violence between Sunni and Shia now run so deep, it could take generations for the country to become peaceful.
BRIG. GEN. JOHN CUSTER, U.S. ARMY: We're in a self-sustaining cycle of violence is the way I put it. There are demographics within Baghdad that both sides are trying to change, Sunni, Shia. There are death squads on both sides.
STARR: Army Brigadier General John Custer is the senior intelligence officer for General John Abizaid at the U.S. Central Command. He gave CNN a rare interview as Abizaid travels throughout the region. Custer says the violence is at the core of what he calls a revenge society that now is Iraq.
CUSTER: The Shia are trying to move Sunnis out of mixed neighborhoods to turn some neighborhoods into more Shia-based neighborhoods. The Sunnis are resisting, the Sunnis are then coming back at the Shia.
STARR: U.S. military intelligence believes Iran is playing a significant, but perhaps not decisive, role in supporting Shia militias and death squads. Custer says the largest Shia militia, Muqtada al-Sadr's Madhi army, now has an Iranian-controlled element inside Iraq.
U.S. officials say members of the Madhi army have trained both in Iran and Lebanon. Custer thinks Sadr's recent move to pull his crucial support from Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki may backfire.
CUSTER: He faces quite a strain there because the network of patronage that he acquires from that is a great deal of his power. So we question how long he can do that.
STARR: But it is the revenge society of Iraq that Custer is focused on. Iran, he says, is not the central issue.
CUSTER: If I could snap my fingers and move Iran out of the picture it wouldn't change -- it wouldn't end the conflict. It wouldn't drastically change the conflict. It's not decisive.
STARR (on camera): But what is clear, General Custer believes, is that the Shia are now willing to spend years getting their revenge against the Sunnis -- Wolf.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLITZER: All right, Barbara. Thanks very much. A very, very sobering assessment from the U.S. military intelligence officer there on the ground in the region.
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0611/30/sitroom.03.html