[jyl]

US troops will start pulling out of Iraq by the end of 2008, if not earlier.

That is as close to a sure thing as you can get in American politics.

Democratic politicians want the war to end soon. Republican politicians want the war to end soon. The great majority of American voters want the war to end soon. The Presidential candidates want the war to end soon, except McCain who is falling behind. The only ones who want the war to continue are Bush/Cheney, and their relevance shrinks with every passing day.

We agonize here about what sort of Iraq the pullout will leave behind, whether it'll be chaos etc. In the end, the civil war in Iraq won't stop the US from pulling out. Sentiments like the ones expressed in this thread - "to hell with those ungrateful Iraqis, etc" - will become mainstream, and then we'll leave.