Abizaid Sees No Civil War.

The US commander in the Middle East, Gen. John Abizaid, on Aug. 24 met in Baghdad with Gen. George Casey Jr., who commands US forces in Iraq. Speaking to reporters later, Abizaid said Iraq was not near a civil war. His remarks stood in apparently stark contrast to comments Abizaid made in Senate testimony in Washington earlier in August, when he said that sectarian violence in Iraq was the worst he had seen and that a civil war was possible.

Abizaid on Aug. 24 said "I think there has been great progress on the security front in Baghdad recently. We are very optimistic that the situation will stabilize". He said comments he made earlier before the US Senate had been misrepresented, adding: "I never said that Iraq was one foot from civil war. It is amazing how you say things sometimes and they get reported differently. I believe there is danger of civil war in Iraq, but only a danger. I think Iraq is far from it".

The US military has sent reinforcements to Baghdad to help the government take back the streets from sectarian militias and death squads, who have been blamed for the killing of thousands in violence. US commanders have said their clampdown - which has put an additional 12,000 US and Iraqi forces on the city's streets - has produced a sharp decline in violence in some deadly Sunni and Shi'ite areas.

In an opinion piece published in the Wall Street Journal on Aug. 23, US Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad repeated statements made by Iraqi and US leaders that the operation to pacify Baghdad was a make-or-break mission, saying: "The battle of Baghdad will determine the future of Iraq, which will itself go a long way to determining the future of the world's most vital region". He wrote that in July Baghdad experienced a 10% increase over the already high monthly average of violent incidents, leaving 2,100 people dead. He said 77% of the casualties were the result of sectarian violence, "giving rise to fears of an impending civil war in Iraq".