disposal. if al maliki starts killing lots of sunnis in fallujah, particularly fallujah but also ramadi, then we could have a open civil war in this country, a fully declared civil war, which would be dramatic escalation. and richard, vice president biden called al maliki yesterday and john kerry spoke about this in the last couple of days. what they ve been urging him to do is be more aggressive but their disappointment is he did not work with the sunni moderates with whom pelt tray us and others worked to try to spark the sunni awakening and regain control of fallujah during the war. they ve been very disappointed with al maliki. reporter: incredibly disappointed. i ve spoken to a lot of u.s. military commanders and american officials involved in the iraq
maliki has an enormous problem. it s not clear how he s going to solve this problem. so far he has chosen to escalate, sending tanks and artillery to ramadi, the city remained surrounded. al qaeda militants are in the center of fallujah. but today the iraqi defense ministry said it s not going to enter fallujah or invade the city yet because it s worried about creating civilian casualties. the city is surrounded and being attacked by air strikes and by the occasional artillery bombardment, refugees are leaving but the militants aren t giving up. they are still there. if a al maliki invades, it s going to be a bloody situation. when the united states invaded, it was a blood j situation. the iraqis will be cruder in their types of offensive without the o sophisticated intelligence of the united states at its
war project, if you will. and they for years have been frustrated with al maliki saying he s not bringing the sunnis on board. he s treating the sunnis who are 20 to 25% of the population like second class citizens like criminals, not giving them adequate political representation. now when the war just across the border in syria exploded, it destabilized iraq. it inspired the sunnis in there who were already feeling down trodden it take up arms and try to topple their government. they believe it is a sectarian government like the one in syria. so what do you do now? united states is saying we want you to be more inclusive but we want you to be tougher. what exactly does that mean? we want you to go in and blast fallujah, kill a lot of sunnis and try and pass fi the city or do they want you to go back and readdress the old roots of the
ramadi as the conflict spreads from syria across the border to iraq potentially engulfing an entire region. the u.s. offered fire missiles but no u.s. combat troops. joining me is richard engel. this is deja vu all over again and enormous tragedy to see iraq engulfed in sectarian war fair in the very place where the surge helped regain those cities and where we lost so many american lives as you witnessed yourself. well, it must be incredible depressing for american troops who served there and commanders and the civilian contractors who contracted to this effort to see once again al qaeda in the center of fallujah in the center of ramadi. right now the iraqi government, particularly prime minister al
problem, that were al maliki was considered a sectarian leader who wasn t bringing in sunnis. does he invade fallujah or try to reach out? the u.s. are hands off and rearming with the missiles and unarmed drones, surveillance drones, but u.s. troops, there are 100 high level trainers in baghdad and 100 security people in baghdad guarding the embassy but no boots on the ground. that is the claim from the u.s. side. thank you so much richard pleasure. your last thoughts. reporter: i was going to say, if al maliki goes in based on the kinds of artillery and tanks he s been sending to the outskirts of fallujah, it s not going to be an offensive with drones. it s going to be shelling. it s going to be tanks moving through the streets.