TRYING TIMES

Our problem in Iraq is the fact that the suicide bombings are obfuscating the real issue. As long as there are terrorists from outside the country indiscriminately killing civilians, the President and his war staff can continue to make the lame arguement that we are merely fighting a war on terror. But we are not. More importantly to ending our presense in Iraq is the aknowledgement that we are really fighting the nationalist sentiments of the Sunni minority. Terrorists know this and will continue attempting to meld the two movements indefinitely. The problem is similar to Vietnam, because it allows contemporary politicians to make the same type of black and white pronouncements the Johnson and Nixon administrations made. They probably really do believe we are really fighting a war against terrorism, just as Johnson probably convinced himself we were really fighting Communism in Vietnam and not a Nationalist movement.