Iraq War: Sometimes a headline says it all

"I think we are winning.  Okay?  I think we're definitely winning.  I think we've been winning for some time." - Gen. Richard Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on the Iraq War 04/26/05

"I just wonder if they will ever tell us the truth." - Harold Casey, Louisville, KY, October 2004.

In this case, it's Juan Cole's headline on his own post about the state of the Iraq War: Sometimes You are Just Screwed Informed Comment blog 05/25/05.

He's referring to how the Bush administration has created a no-win situation for the US in Iraq.  On the one hand, the insurgency looks to go on for years to come.  The US and the Iraqi government combined don't have nearly enough troops to deal with the current insurgency.  And there's little practical possibility of the US fielding more troops in the immediate future.

On the other hand, if the US were to pull out immediately, that could create a catastrophic collapse in Iraq that could also have major negative effects for American interests.

The whole post is good.  These are his concluding thoughts (my emphasis):

In an ideal world, the United States would relinquish Iraq to a United Nations military command, and the world would pony up the troops needed to establish order in the country in return for Iraqi good will in post-war contract bids. But that is not going to happen for many reasons. George W. Bush is a stubborn man and Iraq is his project, and he is not going to give up on it. And, by now the rest of the world knows what would await its troops in Iraq, and political leaders are not so stupid as to send their troops into a meat grinder.

Therefore, I conclude that the United States is stuck in Iraq for the medium term, and perhaps for the long term. The guerrilla war is likely to go on a decade to 15 years. Given the basic facts, of capable, trained and numerous guerrillas, public support for them from Sunnis, access to funding and munitions, increasing civil turmoil, and a relatively small and culturally poorly equipped US military force opposing them, led by a poorly informed and strategically clueless commander-in-chief who has made himself internationally unpopular, there is no near-term solution.

In the long run, say 15 years, the Iraqi Sunnis will probably do as the Lebanese Maronites did, and finally admit that they just cannot remain in control of the country and will have to compromise. That is, if there is still an Iraq at that point.

Cole has summed it up pretty well.  Sometimes you are just screwed.