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Volume II. Words like "won" or "victory" really do not apply when speaking of counterinsurgency operations. Insurgencies grow from problems and discontent within a given society. Solve the problems, and the insurgency goes away, as opposed to being defeated. The difficulty is that a government is not always willing to address the root causes of the insurgency because it is often the government itself that the insurgents want to eliminate. In Iraq to a very large degree, we-the U.S. military and civilians- were the source of the insurgency. Honest men and women can argue the whys, what-ifs, and what mighthave- beens, but ultimately, it was mostly about unfulfilled promises and the heavy-handed military approach taken by some over the summer of 2003 that caused events to spiral out of control. No doubt the insurgency radicalized over time with al-Qaeda and Shi'a extremists playing a key role, but the insurgents did not initiate the war and only took advantage of the discontent. If you asked Anbaris during my third tour in Iraq in 2008 why the insurgency began, most would look away and try to find a way not to answer. They would tell you that "we are friends now, and the causes are unimportant. It's all water under the bridge now." If pressed, they would talk about mutual misunderstandings and a lack of cultural awareness on both sides. They would say that expectations were too high on the part of the Iraqis about what America could do for them and how fast, but they seldom if ever blamed us directly. Press them further and they would mention the 29 April 2003 "massacre" in Fallujah, but more about the lack of an apology than the 70-plus unarmed citizens allegedly shot that day. Another factor they would bring up was the shock and humiliation of having their army disbanded. The army was the one institution in Iraq everyone was proud of-Shi'a and Sunni alike- especially for what it had accomplished in protecting the nation against the Iranians in the 1980s. They perceived the disbanding as intentional contempt directed toward Iraq as a nation and as a people. They also saw it as the disarming of the nation. In the minds of many, this is when our status as liberators ended and that of occupier began. Press the Anbaris one more time, and they would look you in the eye-but only if you are considered a friend-and they would state that after Baghdad fell and throughout the summer of 2003, the Americans overreacted to small acts of resistance or violence and fought in a way that was cowardly and without honor. Here they would talk about the senseless use of firepower and midnight raids on innocent men. They said that by our escalation, we proved true the rhetoric of the nationalist firebrands about why we had invaded, and our actions played directly into the hands of organizations like Zarqawi's al-Qaeda in Iraq and Sadr's militia.

Proceedings of the 13th Pacific Rim First Year in Higher Education Conference held in Adelaide in June 2010.

The Rise and Fall of Cannabis Prohibition in Wisconsin, is a groundbreaking book from longtime Wisconsin medical cannabis patient/activist Gary Storck. In the book, Storck explores how cannabis first became illegal in Wisconsin, subsequent legislation that steeply increased penalties and the efforts made in the last 50 plus years to undo it.