Quote from AAAintheBeltway:
Good observations. Hard to explain, except for the powerful combination of incompetency, PC considerations and fear of the media. Look at the storm the media and the Democrats have kicked up over relatively minor issues like gitmo, civilians getting killed, etc. Of course, they seem to be totally unconcerned with muslim on muslim slaughter and terrorism and not too concerned about insurgent on American terrorism, torture, decapitations, etc.
I think the root of the problem is the administration never really grasped the concept of what an occupation means. The sucessful occupations in history have either involved high levels of brutality, eg Roman Empire, Japanese, Chinese, North Vietnamese, a supine population , eg French in WW II, or a totally defeated and demoralized enemy, eg, Japan and Germany.