LOS ANGELES (CBS) -- Southland Iraqis, some of whom have fled their homeland since the 2003 conflict, are divided between a phased troop withdrawal and increased military action aimed at quelling the insurgency, it was reported.

"It is total anarchy," said Imam Moustafa Al-Qazwini, who heads the Islamic Educational Center of Orange County. "We need a miracle to solve the problems."

Al-Qazwini's father, an ayatollah in the holy city of Karbala, was shot in June in a botched assassination attempt.

Muhannad Eshaiker, an Irvine construction executive, said his business partner was kidnapped in Baghdad and forced to pay $50,000 in ransom for his release.

Al-Qazwini and Eshaiker are divided, like many of the estimated 50,000 Iraqi-Americans who live in Southern California, over what should happen in their homeland.

Many believe federalism can work in Iraq, keeping the country united with a degree of autonomy for the various regions controlled respectively by Kurds, Shiite Muslims and Sunnis.

However Tahsin Atrushi, president of the Kurdish Community Center in San Diego, said that partitioning Iraq would be best because of what he sees as unbridgeable divides among the three groups.

"I don't think these wounds can be healed," he said.

Almost all agreed that, with the exception of the Kurdish north, Iraq is sliding into nearly uncontrollable chaos.

Al-Qazwini, who is mostly Shiite, favors a phased troop withdrawal, however some fear the violence could escalate.

"I can't imagine a worse scenario than what we're experiencing now," he said. "The American occupation has been more of a burden. Talk of a pullout will give Iraqis some hope."

Eshaiker had not been in Iraq for about 25 years until he traveled there in 2003. He said he was shocked that an engineer he hired didn't even know how to turn on a computer, much less use it.

Eshaiker, who left Iraq for England in 1977 to study urban planning and settled in Southern California in 1986, said fear ruled in Baghdad. He told a story about a man who left his car in the street when it ran out of gas. Neighbors became alarmed, worried that it was booby-trapped, and the entire neighborhood evacuated itself.

"Because of the lack of government, an honest guy who ran out of gas created havoc and paralyzed a neighborhood for an entire day," he said.

Like Al-Qazwini, Eshaiker favors a phased troop withdrawal.

However Hasan Alkhatib, a Silicon Valley software entrepreneur, said that would be a "disaster of untold proportions," because it would empower the insurgents.

lkhatib, who came to the United States in 1976 to attend graduate school, said U.S. forces need to smash the insurgents.

"Somebody has to take charge," he said. "We can't afford to waffle."

More than 5 million Iraqis fled their homeland since 2003.

Alkhatib's brother-in-law left San Jose for Iraq six months after Saddam Hussein's ouster to rebuild electrical and cable networks.

"But every time he built something, the insurgents blew it up," Alkhatib said. "It was a futile endeavor."

Then, about a year ago, his brother-in-law's partner forced to pay a $1-million ransom for his release, according to media reports. The partner took his family and fled to Jordan, and his brother-in-law gave up too.

Noori Barka, president of the Chaldean American Foundation in San Diego, said about half of Iraq's 1.2 million Christians had fled the country.