Why does anyone (including kos
today) speak of civil war in Iraq in the future tense? It is
already civil war. If I try to be non-partisan, and I try not to be glib, that is about the only conclusion I can come to.
Accept for a minute the proposition that Iraq is self-ruled. According to the Bush administration, this began in April. Sure, it's not democratic self-rule, but Allawi is calling the shots. He is Iraqi. He commands the Iraqi police, the Iraqi military and every member and/or employee of the government, right?
Yes, the insurgents continue to attack US troops. But they also have been attacking Iraqis. They've been killing Iraqi military, Iraqi police, politicians, clerics' aides. Deputies to governors, governors themselves, senior ministry officials, senior career diplomats, president of the governing council, judges, members of the governing council, and more and more.
The insurgents are killing Iraqis. Iraqis run the government.
Iraqis are fighting Iraqis for control of Iraq. (Candidates for office now keep their identities secret because even announcing their candidacy makes them targets of the insurgents.) That is civil war. That is civil war now. That's been civil war for months.
It is not simply the "situation" in Iraq, or the "insurgency" in Iraq. It has been the Iraqi Civil War.
The only way that this could not be considered civil war would be if Iraqis did not have self rule, e.g., when Viceroy Bremer was still there and making all decisions. To the extent that we are still calling the shots, it is not civil war. To the extent the Iraqis are now calling the shots, it is.
As long as the Bush administration claims that Iraqis are in charge (and Iraq is not just a puppet state), we should respect that claim enough to recognize the Iraqi "insurgency" for what it is - a civil war.