cite="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5973272/site/newsweek/">For U.S.
troops in Iraq, one especially sore point is the stateside public’s
obsession with the candidates’ decades-old military service. “Stop
talking about Vietnam,” says one U.S. official who has spent time in
the Sunni Triangle. “People should be debating this war, not that
one.” His point was not that America ought to walk away from Iraq.
Hardly any U.S. personnel would call that a sane suggestion. But
there’s widespread agreement that Washington needs to rethink its
objectives, and quickly. “We’re dealing with a population that hovers
between bare tolerance and outright hostility,” says a senior U.S.
diplomat in Baghdad. “This idea of a functioning democracy here is
crazy. We thought that there would be a reprieve after sovereignty,
but all hell is breaking loose.

MSNBC:
09-12-2004