Operation Iraqi Freedom

2003 Iraq War (3/20/2003-) is presently the largest war operation in the world^{[Citation Needed]}, started when the United States and allies including the United Kingdom launched a combat operation against Iraq, with the stated goal of deposing dictator Saddam Hussein and bring Iraq into compliance with United Nations resolutions regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction programs. The war is currently ongoing, and there exists a large debate over topics such as withdrawal of American forces and the role of nations in the region. The administration argues that the war is is crucial to the larger U.S. led War on Terrorism. Democrats have criticised the administration for percieved blunders in the war on terror, and have themselves been criticized for doing so.

Iraqi Liberation

Iraqis welcomed the American invasion and overthrow of Saddam Hussein, and in the proceeding months, were optimistic about their country's future. An 'American Enterprise'-'Wall Street Journal'-Zogby poll in September 2003 found that "Seven out of 10 say they expect their country and their personal lives will be better five years from now. On both fronts, 32% say things will become much better". Furthermore, in a March 2004 poll of Iraqis, the BBC found that Iraqis have great hope in a stable, unified government for their country, with 80% of respondents favoring a centralized state ruled from Baghdad. Since 2004, the situation has deteriorated to the point where some people are referring to the incessant strife as a 'Civil War".

Insurgency

However, Iraqi opposition to the American presence, both politically and militarily, has gradually increased since 2003. A secret British Ministry of Defence poll conducted in late 2005 found that 82 percent of Iraqis were "strongly opposed" to the presence of Coalition soldiers in Iraq. The same poll found support for Iraqi rebels at 45%, rising to 65% in Maysan province, although a poll by the IRI in March 2006 found 78% of respondents answered that "violence is never acceptable".

A poll commissioned by the University of Maryland's Program on International Policy Attitudes in the autumn of 2006 found that Iraqi support for anti-Coalition violence had risen to 61%. Similarly, a U.S. State Department poll conducted in 2006 found that "two-thirds of Iraqis in Baghdad favor an immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops". Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians have fled to neighboring Jordan and Syria since the 2003 invasion.

Since the removal of Saddam, the United States has been in the middle of Arab Sunni and Arab Shia. Among the Arab Shia majority, notably the Jaysh Al-Madhi, have began to attack American and other coalition troops even while the coalition has been protecting the Shia from Sunni attacks. Other Shia groups that have not attacked coalition forces have pursued their own factional aims while relying on the US to ensure Shia majority rule. To many if not most Sunnis, the US is viewed as the enemy because it supports Shia majority rule. As the Arab Sunni interpret Muslim law, only Muslims may rule a Muslim state, and the Shia are considered heretics and thus not fit to lead the nation. Though a minority, the Sunni have traditionally ruled Iraq and view themselves entitled to continue the privilge of doing so.

Weapons of Mass Destruction

Although no physical weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq, the search is not over, and it has yielded some results so far. Persons associated with the programs have been detained and documents related to various programs have yet to be translated. Only about one-third of 36 million captured pages have been examined by a linguist and a summary gist of the document prepared. Some believe the physical WMDs that had been produced prior to the invasion were smuggled out of the country, possibly to Syria, before the onset of the war.

In 2004, the Iraq Survey Group released what has been called the Duelfer Report, named after chairman Charles Duelfer. The report was controversial on both sides of the political arena, since while it found that Saddam Hussein was intent on production of WMDs and actively working to undermine international sanctions to do so (in particular by gaming the Oil-for-Food program), the report also found that Hussein's capacity to produce WMDs had deteriorated significantly since 1991, the end of the First Gulf War when Hussein effectively terminated the functional operation of his nuclear program, that no physical WMDs were in Iraq at the time of invasion, and that any remaining WMD-related programs were "not of a militarily significant capability." Former Survey Group Chairman David Kay said "I don't think they existed... What everyone was talking about is stockpiles produced after the end of the last Gulf War and I don't think there was a large-scale production program in the nineties"

Costs

(Needs more statistics) Since the war is not yet over, the total cost has yet to be tallied. However, the Congressional Budget Office estimates that the war has, as of 3/12/2007, cost less than $400 Billion.

External links

• Iraq Weekly Status Report U.S. Department of State.