In fact, the US military and the US Embassy were well aware of the serious risk that the strategy of relying on vengeful Shia police commandos to track down Sunnis would exacerbate sectarian tensions between Sunnis and Shia. In May 2005, Ann Scott Tyson wrote in the Washington Post that US military analysts did not deny that the US strategy “aggravates the underlying fault lines in Iraqi society, heightening the prospects of civil strife”. In late July 2005, when Petraeus was still heading the command, an unnamed “senior American officer” at MNSTC-I was asked by John F. Burns of the New York Times whether the US might end up arming Iraqis for a civil war. The officer answered, “Maybe”. Full article.