Can anyone now say the Surge isn't working? - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

Seaver · 01-12-2008, 04:52 PM

Quote:

The Toughest Fight in Anbar Province
Military.com | By Christian Lowe | January 11, 2008

KARMAH, Iraq - It's a new kind of fight these Marines weren't exactly counting on. And it might be the toughest one they've had to endure in this war-ravaged country.

After preparing to confront one of the most deadly insurgencies America has ever faced, and steeped in the legend of Marine aggressiveness in the counterterrorist fight, the leathernecks of Lima Company, 3rd Battalion, 3rd Marines are fighting a pitched battle against boredom.

With violence across the province dropping precipitously over most of the past year, Marines who were girding for a brawl on this latest rotation have had to dial back their warrior ways for a softer approach.

Though their thoughts are tinged with disappointment, many are nevertheless practical about the new reality.

"There's not much going on this time around," said Cpl. Ken Dickerson, 1st squad leader with Lima Company, 3/3's 3rd Platoon. "But at least we're not losing anybody."

The two years preceding this Hawaii-based battalion's August deployment were some of the most violent for U.S. forces in its nearly five year occupation of Iraq. But since the surge of 30,000 troops launched in early 2007, violent incidents in Anbar have dropped to levels unthinkable just a year ago.

According to officials with II Marine Expeditionary Force, there were about 170 "significant events" in Fallujah, about five miles from here, during the first week of January 2007. That includes firefights, IED attacks, mine explosions and roadside bombs that were discovered, but that did not detonate.

By the last week of December, the number of "sigevents," as they're called here, in Fallujah dropped to less than 20.

In Ramadi, the capitol of the Sunni-dominated Anbar province and a troubled hot spot for years, incidents dropped from 198 in one week of February 2007, to three by the last week of the year.

II MEF officials attribute this massive shift to a population fed up with al Qaida in Iraq's terrorist tactics and rejuvenated tribal governance that cast its lot with American efforts to bolster the national government.

Whatever the reason for the reduction in violence, Marines in the field have switched from rifles to paint brushes and from bullets to handshakes.

For some of leathernecks here on their first deployment, it's a bit of a let-down. One Marine in 3rd platoon who's a veteran of the fierce Fallujah fight in November of 2004 said it's been tough to keep his Marines motivated after regaling them with stories of that epic battle. They came here to fight, he said, and instead they're patrolling streets teeming with people, devoid of enemy activity.

In fact, Lima Company hasn't fired a single shot in anger since early October, its commander, Capt. Quintin Jones, said.

And that's just fine with him. As local police take greater control of their towns and local citizens help keep al Qaida malcontents from detonating bombs in their markets, the Marines here are left with little to do but reconstruction and institution building - an overall mission that has one every Marine can appreciate.

"It might be a little boring here now," said Lance Cpl. Parker Winnett, a radio operator with 3rd Platoon's 1st squad. "But at least I'll come home alive."

Even John Murtha, who compared our troops to Nazis has described the VAST success of the surge.

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07333...pid=latest.xml

Quote:

Murtha finds military progress in trip to Iraq
Warns that Iraqis must do more for their own security
Thursday, November 29, 2007
By Jerome L. Sherman, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

WASHINGTON - U.S. Rep. John Murtha today said he saw signs of military progress during a brief trip to Iraq last week, but he warned that Iraqis need to play a larger role in providing their own security and the Bush administration still must develop an exit strategy.

"I think the 'surge' is working," the Democrat said in a videoconference from his Johnstown office, describing the president's decision to commit more than 20,000 additional combat troops this year. But the Iraqis "have got to take care of themselves."

Violence has dropped significantly in recent months, but Mr. Murtha said he was most encouraged by changes in the once-volatile Anbar province, where locals have started working closely with U.S. forces to isolate insurgents linked to Al Qaeda.

So, the Marines in Anbar Province (Al Qaeda stronghold just 1 year ago) biggest problem they admit themselves is boredom. Can there be people who are still saying the Surge won't work?

Can we realistically say that the Counter-Insurgency is, and has been, working?

Willravel · 01-12-2008, 04:59 PM

I'm one of those people that says the surge isn't working, and here's why:

Quote:

Period US UK Other* Total Avg Days
6 836 44 9 889 2.58 345
5 933 32 20 985 2.39 412
4 715 13 18 746 2.35 318
3 580 25 27 632 2.93 216
2 718 27 59 804 1.9 424
1 140 33 173 4.02 43
Total 3922 174 133 4229 2.41 1758

http://icasualties.org/oif/

Period 6 is the "surge" (2/1/07-today). Notice how the average after the surge (2.58) is higher than the average before (2.39). Not only that, but there is no evidence whatsoever that Iraqi civilian deaths have decreased.

Seaver · 01-12-2008, 05:15 PM

Quote:

Dec-07 548
Dec-06 1,752

Nope, those numbers have not changed at all.

The nail in the coffin is John "Nazi" Murtha admitting we're on the road to success. Bombings are down, attacks are down, security forces are having more success working as the primary assault forces, and utilities are returning to larger areas around the country.

No we can't just pull out now and expect it to be hunky-dory, but to ignore the success is just being stubborn.

roachboy · 01-12-2008, 05:16 PM

thing is, seaver, that in this kind of conflict, there are going to be spaces that are more or less active and times when they will and wont be as well--there's nothing like a consistent battle-line or any type of continuous engagement--so alot of bets are off in terms of assessment of that is happening overall based on anecdotal evidence. without meaning to trivialize anything, its almost like from an old-school military strategy perspective, this war is entirely anecdotal.

so what i think is in that particular sector, the goal of the offensive or "surge" worked, but it's not obvious how--these particular folk might be sitting around alot, but you can't tell if this follows from a "win" in the sense of much meaningful destruction of an enemy the americans can actually find on a consistent basis, or if they simply moved. the writer of the article doesn't know either way and draws no conclusions from this particular situation.

fact is that it's hard to make any global assessments.
casualty rates overall indicate that the fighting is diffuse but continuous, more or less---so that's one.
assessments of what if going on in general that do not originate with the american press pool paint a darker picture than the article you bit above, which does come from the pool. what you rarely get in the america press--fed to the pool--is anything that even appears to be a rational assessment of the overall situation. what the press has become, in the context of the press pool, is a marketing relay system that links pentagon-cleared infotainment to press outlets to a public.

and then you have a contextual change in that turkey appears to be already making forays into kurdish territory in the north and is gearing up for a larger operation maybe, so that'll tank the situation in kurdistan.

but seriously, it's hard to feel as though we as merely the public have information reliable or comprehensive enough to *know* anything--we can assemble information that gives a *sense* of it, but there are always mitigating factors that can be introduced--so it comes down in a strange way to what you want to see. and it's at this point that judgments become difficult: if you opposed the war, is there a level of vindication to be had from assembling a negative image? does that mean then that you are treating violence as a source of pleasure/confirmation? or if you supported the war, does the contrary hold? and if that's the case, do parallel a prior committments cause you to not look at information to the contrary?

i dont say this because i have a secret card to introduce at the end that will reveal all--i say it because i think this is pretty much the position the ongoing informational and political management process has put us in.

Ustwo · 01-12-2008, 05:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Seaver

Nope, those numbers have not changed at all.

The nail in the coffin is John "Nazi" Murtha admitting we're on the road to success. Bombings are down, attacks are down, security forces are having more success working as the primary assault forces, and utilities are returning to larger areas around the country.

No we can't just pull out now and expect it to be hunky-dory, but to ignore the success is just being stubborn.

You beat me to it Sever.

Sadly a 'victory' in Iraq is the last thing the American left wants right now, for obvious reasons.

Willravel · 01-12-2008, 05:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Seaver

Nope, those numbers have not changed at all.

So in your opinion the surge is only held once a year? Or do you think that December is the only month that counts?

The rate of coalition deaths has increased since the surge, as I stated and supported above, and there is absolutely no evidence that Iraqi civilian death rates have dropped off. In fact, they are not only holding steady but are increasing. Displacement of Iraqi civilians is the highest in history, let alone the past few years. How would you measure success?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

Sadly a 'victory' in Iraq is the last thing the American left wants right now, for obvious reasons.

There's no such thing as "victory" in Iraq until certain terms are provided by those committing the war. If Bush can come on TV and say, "We will have won when a, b and c have been accomplished", then we may have some idea of when this mess may finish.

The left didn't want us there in the first place. Had we not been ignored thousands of American soldiers would be with their families, millions of Iraqis would be alive, and Katrina wouldn't have been a problem because the National Guard would have been home to take care of an actual threat to the US. The right is guilty of genocide and treason.

But let's blame the left, shall we?

Ustwo · 01-12-2008, 05:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by willravel

So in your opinion the surge is only held once a year? Or do you think that December is the only month that counts?

The rate of coalition deaths has increased since the surge, as I stated and supported above, and there is absolutely no evidence that Iraqi civilian death rates have dropped off. In fact, they are not only holding steady but are increasing. Displacement of Iraqi civilians is the highest in history, let alone the past few years. How would you measure success?

No it hasn't

http://www.globalsecurity.org/milita...casualties.htm

Its pretty clear its been on the decline since September, or do you expect dramatic results the day the surge started and use that as proof of failure?

Come on suck it up, something is working in Iraq besides running Kusinich style.

Willravel · 01-12-2008, 05:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

No it hasn't

No what hasn't? No the number of coalition deaths hasn't increased since February of 2007? You're dead wrong on that one, along with the 345 dead soldiers that you dishonor.

roachboy · 01-12-2008, 05:29 PM

i wouldn't normally do this, but there is a more productive way to manage this discussion than falling directly into this republicans-versus-everybody else kinda thing or it's inverse.

i tried to outline why above--i'll just repeat it here:

a. from a vertically organized military viewpoint, this is an "unconventional war" so the traditional ways of measuring what happened and why are not operative--no more in iraq than in vietnam (remember the daily body count?) despite the self-evident differences between the situations.

b. the article in the op makes NO judgements as to WHY things are calm for this particular batallion. so it provides NO basis for making stuff up about why the situation obtains. seaver at least brought up the obvious next move--try to find a way to generalize from this--but it's not terribly informative as an index. it just isn't. think about it.

c. then there is the problem of information management, marketing war, etc etc etc.

d. then there is the problem of where and how you might get information that might actually BE informative about the general situation.

e. but because the information is so scattered and comes from a wide range of sources, any of us can fall into the game of projection with a few arbitrary references draped around it. you know, politics as 'just my opinion man"--this shows why that's worthless yet again.

this last point is a **problem** and we are all wasting our time talking about iraq right now unless we acknowledge it. but doing that would make it less easy to take facile shots at each other. so maybe it's a good idea to head that way.

Elphaba · 01-12-2008, 06:02 PM

The purpose of the surge was to provide the "breathing space" needed that would allow the Iraqi government to achieve specific goals. The government has further fractured over the period of the surge and has ceased to be functional in any meaningful way.

It should also be noted that al-Sadr has ordered his Mahdi Army to stand down temporarily and I think some of the reduction in conflict can be credited to that.

Our occupation of Iraq has more to do with the ongoing insurgency than any surge is able to resolve. What is the "victory" we hope to achieve, if we are the source of the problem?

roachboy · 01-12-2008, 06:10 PM

btw just in case we ever reach the point of talking about specific places/situations, there's a useful map of iraq here:

http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/middl...q_pol_2004.jpg

with a zoom.

it's also possible that this has an effect on the overall conflict situation:

Quote:

Iraq opens door to Saddam's followers

A bill to restore rights of former Baathists ends a bitter and divisive legacy of American bungling

Peter Beaumont, foreign affairs editor
Sunday January 13, 2008
The Observer

It is now seen as the most disastrous decision of the US-led occupation of Iraq - the firing of hundreds of thousands of former members of Saddam Hussein's Baath party from their government jobs in April 2003.

Enacted by the Coalition Provisional Authority's head, Paul Bremer, it created a powerful impetus that pushed former Baathists towards rebellion and many took up arms with the insurgents. In a single swoop former officials and members of the Saddam-era security forces, many of them concentrated in the Sunni Triangle, were rendered unemployed. It caused the impoverishment of whole communities, stoking up resentment to the presence of coalition troops.

Now with the fifth anniversary of the invasion of Iraq around the corner, the country's parliament has finally reversed the last vestiges of that ill-considered policy, passing new legislation yesterday that reinstates tens of thousands of former supporters of Saddam Hussein's Baath party to the possibility of government employment. The new bill, approved by a unanimous show of hands on each of its 30 clauses, was requested by the US as part of efforts to reduce sectarian tension between Sunni and Shia. In the process it became the first piece of major legislation approved by the 275-seat parliament.

'This law preserves the rights of the Iraqi people after the crimes committed by the Baath Party while also benefiting the innocent members of the party. This law provides a balance,' said government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh. It was also welcomed by US President George W Bush, visiting Kuwait, who said Iraq had taken 'an important step toward reconciliation'. The new act - approved yesterday, and entitled the Accountability and Justice law - is designed to lift restrictions on the rights of members of the now-dissolved Baath party to fill government posts.

It is also designed to reinstate thousands of Baathists dismissed from government jobs after the 2003 US invasion - a decision that deepened sectarian tensions between Iraq's majority Shia and the once-dominant Sunni Arabs, who believed the firings targeted their community. Strict implementation of so-called de-Baathification rules also meant that many senior bureaucrats who knew how to run ministries, university departments and state companies ended up unemployed.

The Bush administration initially promoted de-Baathification but later claimed that Iraqi authorities went beyond even what the Americans had contemplated. With the Sunni insurgency raging and political leaders making little progress in reconciling Iraq's Shia, Sunni Arab and Kurdish communities, the Americans switched positions and urged the dismantling of de-Baathification laws. Later, enacting and implementing legislation reinstating the fired Baath supporters became one of 18 so-called benchmark issues the US sought as measures for progress in national reconciliation.

The legislation can become law only when approved by Iraq's presidential council. The council, comprising Iraq's president and two vice presidents, is expected to ratify the measure. The draft law approved yesterday is not a blanket approval for all former Baathists to take government jobs.

The law will allow low-ranking Baathists not involved in past crimes against Iraqis to go back to their jobs. High-ranking Baathists will be sent to compulsory retirement and those involved in crimes will stand trial, though their families will still have the right to pension. The Baathists who were members in Saddam's security agencies must retire - except for members of Fedayeen Saddam, a feared militia formed by Saddam's eldest son, Uday. They will be entitled to nothing.

The enactment of such a major piece of legislation comes in stark contrast with massive delays still dogging other important pieces of government business still languishing before the parliament with no sign of agreement.

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world...239908,00.html

you know. nothing to do with the surge, but a kinda big deal on its own.
taking apart the legal consequences of the occupation means that maybe--just maybe--some groups which saw themselves as entirely outside conventional politics might reassess their positions.

the "surge" would be a non-sequitor, then.

this isn't an easy interpretive problem: i dont see the point of pretending it is.

Plan9 · 01-12-2008, 06:28 PM

*watches more US Marines deploy to Afghanistan in another "Surge" strategy*

Seaver · 01-12-2008, 06:41 PM

Very Valid points RB, but if you want to take a military historian perspective you can't compare Iraq to Vietnam quite that easily.

Iraq was a counter-insurgency after the 2nd week of the war effectively. There was no military infrastructure, little or no chain of command, and no battle lines. Vietnam constantly switched back and forth between counter-insurgencies and traditional military conflict.

Contrary to popular belief that last statement was true. Every time it switched to traditional military conflict we massacred the Vietnamese. The Tet Offensive, though potrayed as a disaster by the news (nice parallel to your argument), was a complete military success.

The reason I bring this up is counter-insurgencies and traditional military conflicts are fought with completely different tactics, and have wildly different outcomes. Closer parallels to these are the British in Burma (or the Gurkas) or us in the Philippeans. Counter-Insurgencies have always lasted around 10 years, ending with either exhaustion of the enemies or further incorporation and empowerment of said group into the central government.

That is a major reason for your article (which I was aware of, just left out) that I see as no big deal is because it satisfies the second of the prior listing. Yes we are empowering members of a group we just wiped out, however their power is SEVERELY limited and in my opinion is acceptable if it lowers violence. With less than a handful of those prior Ba'ath party members involved in the government, we have won over their family and most likely their entire tribe to supporting the government. All of a sudden we have made a large ally for a small price.

I agree it's hard to gauge, which is why I keep pointing to Murtha. A man who is so strongly opposed to the war from day one is openly stating it is on the mend. I have no doubt he has better access than us to information across the board, and even he has come to believe in the success where no one can say he's just cow-towing to the administration.

ratbastid · 01-12-2008, 07:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elphaba

It should also be noted that al-Sadr has ordered his Mahdi Army to stand down temporarily and I think some of the reduction in conflict can be credited to that.

Exactly, and there are plenty of other contributing factors. It's the most transparent of political grandstanding to say "The surge is working". Is anyone actually naive enough to think that cause-and-effect can possibly be that simple in as complex a theater as Iraq is right now?

loquitur · 01-12-2008, 08:06 PM

actually, ratbastid, I think it depends how you define the "surge." Is it jsut the increase in manpower or the change in command and strategy that called for the increased manpower? It seems obvious (to me, at least) that changing to a more population-based strategy under a counter-insurgency expert (Petraeus) has enabled the US military to react more flexibly and creatively, and to take advantage of the opportunity presented by the sheikhs reasserting their authority when AQI overstepped its bounds and got the population pissed off at them.

I wouldn't say it's the only cause, but clearly it has contributed mightily to the increasing stabilization of the country, the return of refugees, the improving economy, etc, etc, etc. A lot of that is also the Iraqis themselves getting tired of the ongoing instability.

dc_dux · 01-12-2008, 09:08 PM

It hard for me to see much success in the last year. The number and frequency of civilian deaths may be down significantly ...or not, depending on who is counting. But is it a result of the surge or might other factors have had an impact, like the fact that 2 million Iraqis have fled Baghad and surrounding areas.

Baghdad has gone from a multi-ethnic city to a Shiia dominated city, with walls separating the Sunni population, including most of the few returning refugees (who are being told by the goverment to stay away because its still not safe). The few Christians and other minorities are gone for good.

To maintain stability in Baghdad, the US is paying and arming Sunni civilians groups, called Concerned Local Citizens, at the same time we are arming the Shiia dominated police force that is infiltrated by Shiia militant militias. Is a clash between these two groups inevitable?

There has been virtually no progress in meeting political benchmarks and the central government is dysfunctional.

In the South, al Sadar's Mahdi Army is in control of Basra.

In the Anbar area, the so-called Anbar Awakening is where the US has paid and armed Sunni tribal leaders to fight al queda. As a result, violence may be down, but these same tribal leaders have built their own power bases with US money and weapons and have yet to show much loyalty to a central government.

In the north, the US is turning a blind eye as our ally Turkey conducts air strikes into Kurdish areas.

Where's the progress towards long term peace and stability...I just don see it.

And by nearly every poll or focus group of Iraqi citizens, speeches in the Iraqi parliament (on the rare occasions when they actually meet), discussions with persons on the streets in Baghdad, editorials in the local newspapers, etc....the Iraqi people believe that their best hope for success is for the occupation to end and the US troops to go home.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Seaver

I agree it's hard to gauge, which is why I keep pointing to Murtha. A man who is so strongly opposed to the war from day one is openly stating it is on the mend. I have no doubt he has better access than us to information across the board, and even he has come to believe in the success where no one can say he's just cow-towing to the administration.

Murtha also said the central government is dysfunctional and the Bush administration must provide an exit strategy.

And I dont recall Murtha ever comparing US troops to Nazis as you allege.

host · 01-13-2008, 01:47 AM

Yup...it isn't working.....

Compare one of the most accurate corporate news media accounts of what happened in Iraq's broken parliament on saturday. The new law, passed with barely 145 of parliament's 275 seats occupied. The law, window dressing allegedly to benefit predominantly Sunni ex-baathists, was boycotted by 2 blocs totaling 55 Sunni seats, and enthusiastically voted for by Shi'a and Kurdish members.

There is no indication that the surge is working for it's advertised goal to be accomplished...to "buy time" for the Iraqi government to get it's shit togather. Last month the same parliament closed on December 7, for the rest of the month.

You want to be vindicated so badly, if you've supported the illegal invasion and botched US occupation. Iraq is shattered and it will divide into at least three parts, a victory for Iran, unless the US further wrecks it's own future by contriving enough of a provocation to attack Iran.

The surge, to buy time, is a farce, as were the accusations of, and then the hunt for,WMD. The surge is to buy time for GW Bush to save face.

Quote:

http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t...cid=1126228904
Iraq votes to lift ban on ex-Baathists

The legislation, a top U.S. priority, will allow lower-tier members of Saddam Hussein's party to take government jobs.
By Ned Parker, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
January 13, 2008
BAGHDAD -- Iraq's parliament approved a bill Saturday allowing members of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party to return to government jobs, overcoming months of paralysis to pass the first piece of the so-called benchmark legislation the United States has deemed crucial to national reconciliation.

The Bush administration had argued that its troop buildup in Iraq last year would offer breathing room to the country's warring factions, allowing them to make progress on the political front. The legislation was introduced in the parliament in March, but had remained stalled.

Even as violence declined in recent months, Iraq's Shiite and Sunni leaders squabbled and failed to take major steps toward ending the country's sectarian war. Key legislation on dismantling militias, sharing the country's oil wealth, setting election procedures and outlining the relationship between central and provincial powers continues to languish....

....President Bush, who is traveling in the region, called the legislation "an important step toward reconciliation." During a stop in Bahrain, Bush also said it was "an important sign that the leaders in that country must work together and meet the aspirations of the Iraqi people."

But sectarian divisions remain deep in Iraq, and it is unclear whether the new law will have much effect. Critics charge that the legislation is window-dressing.

The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad remained notably cautious, declining to comment until it finished reviewing the draft. The legislation has been through various versions as it made its way through Iraq's halls of power.

The Accountability and Justice Law, as it is called, abolishes the de-Baathification committee, which its detractors accused of firing competent state employees for little reason and using membership in the Baath Party as an excuse for carrying out a political agenda. Some state employers were subject to blackmail by people who threatened to name them to the committee unless they paid up.

"If this law changes the process sufficiently from this inquisition process set up by the Coalition Provisional Authority, it would be a step forward," said a U.S. diplomat who has worked on Iraq issues, referring to the quasi-government that Bremer headed.

The legislation calls for a seven-member national board and a general prosecutor who will investigate current cases, and for Iraq's Justice Ministry to pick seven judges for an appeals court. In a show of tensions, the lawmakers struck down an amendment that would have required that the board be representative of Iraq's sects and ethnicities.

But the new law will not reverse Bremer's original decree barring from the government members of the top four echelons of the Baath Party, though it provides them with pensions.

"This law deals with the Baathists as individuals. . . . It distinguishes between the criminal and the innocent," government spokesman Ali Dabbagh said in an interview with Al Arabiya satellite television channel. "This law is changing [the de-Baathification committee] into a professional judiciary authority far from any political positions."

Until recently, the committee continued to purge people from the ministries and the military on the basis of party membership. In the summer of 2006, even after Prime Minister Nouri Maliki was selected to head a "national unity" government, some technocrats and security officials were fired from the interior, defense and agriculture ministries with little justification.

In one of the most famous cases, Adnan Janabi, a minister without portfolio in 2004 under then-interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, was blocked from serving in the current parliament on account of his Baath Party membership.

"The law is one thing. Another is how it will be implemented. As everyone knows, Maliki and those in his camp are not thrilled about having to do anything, but we've been pushing them hard," the U.S. diplomat said.

Critics of the legislation suspect the new body will be manipulated by the same parties that dominated the old committee. They also worry that any Baathists who seek jobs will be targeted by paramilitary groups.

"I wouldn't come back to my job because of this law," <h3>Sunni parliament member Saleh Mutlak said. "It's humiliating to the people. You have to condemn yourself, and then be investigated, and then you could be killed [by someone] after going to the committee."

The vote itself showed how divided Iraqis remain on the matter. Barely 150 members of the 275-seat parliament attended the session.

Mutlak's National Dialogue Front, with 11 seats, and some members of another Sunni bloc, the 44-seat Iraqi Accordance Front, boycotted the vote.</h3> All major Shiite parties in attendance voted for the legislation, including 30 lawmakers loyal to anti-U.S. cleric Muqtada Sadr. But if some endorsed the measure, others skipped the session rather than vote for a proposal they vehemently opposed.

"I consider this law as a pure American law aiming to restore the Baath Party to the political process," said Sadr lawmaker Maha Adil Mehdi, who boycotted the session. "I refuse this law completely."

Others whose parties have been associated with the mass purges and even attacks on former Baathists backed the law.

"From the beginning, the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council was backing this law because there are many people suffering from this law and others are using this law to revenge and to gain more authority," said parliament member Hamid Mualla, a member of the party.

The Iraqi Islamic Party, the largest Sunni party in parliament, endorsed the legislation as a compromise. "We want to push the national reconciliation ahead and calm things down among the Iraqis, and this might not help a lot," said Nureddine Hayali, a lawmaker with the party.

But the biggest question remains how the law will be applied and whether Shiite hard-liners will work to block former Baathists from returning.

"We know there are certain ministries who opposed this and are in a position to deny jobs to people who would benefit from legislation," said analyst Wayne White, head of the State Department's Iraq intelligence team from 2003 to 2005. "There are people at the local level who have the power to sabotage."

ned.parker@latimes.com

Times staff writers Raheem Salman, Saif Rasheed, Said Rifai and Caesar Ahmed in Baghdad and James Gerstenzang in Bahrain contributed to this report.

If you missed my thread detailing the necon attack on and sabotage of Juan Cole and his career, catch up here:

<a href="http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthread.php?t=127679&highlight=juan+cole+yale">Iraq:"It can be saved and won", Can You Be Reliably Informed Yet Have That Opinion?</a>

Quote:

http://www.juancole.com/2008/01/so-b...y-is-that.html
Sunday, January 13, 2008
New Iraqi Law on Baath Worries Ex-Baathists

.....The passage of the new law will be hailed by the War party as a major achievement. But as usual they will misread what really happened.

If the new law was good for ex-Baathists, then the ex-Baathists in parliament will have voted for it and praised it, right? And likely the Sadrists (hard line anti-Baath Shiites) and Kurds would be a little upset.

Instead, parliament's version of this law was spearheaded by Sadrists, and the ex-Baathists in parliament criticized it.

Somehow that little drawback suggests to me that the law is not actually, as written, likely to be good for sectarian reconciliation.

<a href="http://www.asharqalawsat.com/details.asp?section=4&issue=10638&article=453776">Al-Sharq al-Awsat writes in Arabic</a> that the parliamentarians who criticized the law were drawn from the National Dialogue Council led by ex-Baathist Salih Mutlak, from the Iraqi National List of Iyad Allawi (an ex-Baathist), and from two of the three parties that make up the Sunni Arab National Accord Front.

So the parties in parliament that have the strong Baathist legacy did not like the law one little bit. But they are the ones that it was intended to mollify!

Parliament has been able to get a quorum on several recent occasions, and barely mustered a quorum on Saturday, with 143 members in attendance out of 275. The new law passed with a narrow majority. The vote count was not published anywhere I could find it, but it could have been as low as 72.

Now, when the Iraqi cabinet of PM Nuri al-Maliki initially introduced the draft bill into parliament last November 25, the Sadr Movement deputies rhythmically pounded their desks in protest. The Sadrists have a special and abiding hatred for the Baath Party, which killed both major clergymen that they venerate, Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr (d. 1980) and Muhammad Sadiq al-Sadr (d. 1999). But on Saturday the Sadrists spoke for the new law. Very suspicious.

Al-Sharq al-Awsat says that the current head of the De-Baathification Commission, Falah Hasan Shanshal, is a member of the Sadr Movement. He said, "The law was legislated to punish anyone who committed a crime against the children of the Iraqi people . . . and in tandem, to provide that anyone who had not committed crimes must retire. Those persons may also return to public life, with the exception that some cannot work as bureaucrats in the judicial, ministerial or security bureaucracies, or in the ministries of Foreign Affairs or Finance. He added that "everyone agreed on punishing the Baath Party as a party that committed crimes against the Iraqi people." He expressed the hope that the law would be quickly ratified by the presidential council.

Baha' al-A`raji is a Sadrist and the chairman of the Legislative Committee in parliament. He said that the law in its current form differs essentially from the bill that was sent over from the cabinet. Al-A`raji told al-Sharq al-Awsat that "Some members could not vote for some passages or articles in the current version of the law . . . or could not accept the law in its entirety. But a majority of parliament voted for the law." He added that the law "took into account all the suggestions of the Sadr Movement." The Sadrists had demanded that the De-Baathification Commission not be dissolved, but would accept a change in name for it. They had demanded that the Baath Party remain dissolved, and that the high-ranking members of the party be forbidden to enter the new political life or serve as bureaucrats. The Sadrists had also insisted that any high-ranking Baathists presently employed by the new Iraqi government must be fired!

The headlines are all saying that the law permits Baathists back into public life. It seems actually to demand that they be fired or retired on a pension, and any who are employed are excluded from sensitive ministries.

Al-A'raji was completely unsympathetic to opponents of the law, which he said was now unstoppable.

Members of the Iraqi National Front (Allawi's group), the National Dialogue Front (Mutlak), and two of the three constituent parties of the Iraqi Accord Front (Sunni Arabs), along with some IAF independents, denounced the law in a circulated, signed letter. They said that the law would be "difficult to implement." They indicated that they had not voted for it and do not support it. They called it "unrealistic" because it contains an article forbidding the Baath Party "from returning to power ideologically, administratively, politically or in practice, and under any other name." The law's opponents charged that this language was unconstitutionally vague and could easily be "misused."

What are the ex-Baathists afraid of? Well, they are ex-Baathists in politics. So this objectionable passage seems to make it possible for the Sadrists, e.g., to keep people like Iyad Allawi from ever again enjoying high office. His secular, nationalist Iraqi National Dialogue party could easily just be branded too close to the original Baath Party and dissolved, and he could be excluded from high office by this new provision.....

ratbastid · 01-13-2008, 06:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by loquitur

actually, ratbastid, I think it depends how you define the "surge." Is it jsut the increase in manpower or the change in command and strategy that called for the increased manpower? It seems obvious (to me, at least) that changing to a more population-based strategy under a counter-insurgency expert (Petraeus) has enabled the US military to react more flexibly and creatively, and to take advantage of the opportunity presented by the sheikhs reasserting their authority when AQI overstepped its bounds and got the population pissed off at them.

I wouldn't say it's the only cause, but clearly it has contributed mightily to the increasing stabilization of the country, the return of refugees, the improving economy, etc, etc, etc. A lot of that is also the Iraqis themselves getting tired of the ongoing instability.

That's exactly my point. To say "The surge is working" is to approve of a Bush plan and therefore Bush. I mean, my God, how many months were they hard-selling us on that? The idea that more feet in the dirt would solve the whole problem? And it was a hard sell, because at the time it looked like just sending more American meat into the grinder.

"Surge" was defined as "more troops". Going back now to redefine it as "the prevailing situation as it stands now including all factors" it is disingenuous and is, as I mentioned above, the most transparent of political wordsmithing.

I suspect that other strategies, combined with the other factors you mention, WITHOUT a troop escalation might have produced the same results. It's the approach that should have been taken starting right at "Mission Accomplished". So, I guess I should congratulate the Administration and those accountable for the war effort for only using up three years and 3000+ body bags before they got their heads out of their asses?

Kadath · 01-13-2008, 06:29 AM

Let me ask; does saying the Surge is working imply tacit approval of the entire war/the administration's foreign policy? Does it justify going to war in the first place?

loquitur · 01-13-2008, 09:06 AM

ratbastid, if you believe as I do that "surge" was a misnomer, then yes, the surge is working. The additional troops were requested as a result of a new strategy being implemented, not vice versa.

Not incidentally, that is an indictment of the prior strategy and the people who implemented it. People need to learn from history: the current strategy is more of an Abrams strategy, whereas the prior one was more of a Westmoreland strategy. You'd think that would have been accounted for in the planning, but apparently it wasn't. Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it. And in this case, we lost three years and thousands of precious lives.

ASU2003 · 01-13-2008, 10:44 AM

I will say it appears to be getting better. But, I have no idea on what is going on over there. It could be that they are taking a break and only randomly fighting until a future US president just pulls out. Then the Shiia/Sunni will try for a major power grab.

If McCain becomes president (and we stay in) and the situation is peaceful in 2010, I'll be convinced that we could start making plans for a controlled withdrawal. With the assumption that if things deteriorate, that we would stay longer.

Rekna · 01-13-2008, 04:09 PM

Seaver your post is so miss informed it doesn't suit you well.

First Murtha did not say the surge is working, look at the whole quote. He said some aspects of it is working but the purpose was to provide space for the government to make progress which it has not done. Which means it has failed. It is expected that if we put in more troops the violence would go down but if we removed the troops again what would happen?

Also Anbar province is not where the surge took place and its security improvements is a result of the tribal leaders turning on Iraq not the surge.

Willravel · 01-13-2008, 04:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rekna

Seaver your post is so miss informed it doesn't suit you well.

First Murtha did not say the surge is working, look at the whole quote. He said some aspects of it is working but the purpose was to provide space for the government to make progress which it has not done. Which means it has failed. It is expected that if we put in more troops the violence would go down but if we removed the troops again what would happen?

Also Anbar province is not where the surge took place and its security improvements is a result of the tribal leaders turning on Iraq not the surge.

QFT

highthief · 01-13-2008, 05:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kadath

Let me ask; does saying the Surge is working imply tacit approval of the entire war/the administration's foreign policy? Does it justify going to war in the first place?

To me, that's about where the buck stops - the rabid-right will say "this strategy is working" and the loony-left will "no it isn't".

I have no idea which is which.

But at the end of the day, this whole hair-brained adventure has been a disaster on a bunch of levels, and I cannot conceive that anyone still thinks this was a good idea.

Tens, maybe hundreds of thousands are dead, a country is in pieces, and a whole region is utterly unstable.

Polar · 02-05-2008, 01:37 PM

Even CNN reported (finally) that civilian casualties are down 80% and coalition casualites are down 85%.

Harry Ried, who declared the Surge a failure before all the troops were even on the ground has now changed his tune and stated the Surge is working.

Only those plugging their ears and going "LALALALALALALALALA" would think the Surge isn't doing exactly what it was designed to do.

pr0f3n · 02-05-2008, 02:09 PM

Right, if we push the bar low enough, everyone wins. Just like when recruitment numbers were down, we started recruiting drunks, convicts and retirees. Or when the army stopped reporting bombing deaths as combat casualties. That must be some tasty kool-aid.

keke ^__^ ggnewmap

Willravel · 02-05-2008, 02:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Polar

Even CNN reported (finally) that civilian casualties are down 80% and coalition casualites are down 85%.

Harry Ried, who declared the Surge a failure before all the troops were even on the ground has now changed his tune and stated the Surge is working.

Only those plugging their ears and going "LALALALALALALALALA" would think the Surge isn't doing exactly what it was designed to do.

It's funny you should mention complete and intentional ignorance to the effect of the surge, because your post is a prime example.
The Iraqis had only met three of the eighteen criteria at the time of the legally mandated and required GAO assessment of the Surge's success or failure, BUT NO ONE PANICK! Patraeus says that's okay. ...oh and the decrease in violence? It turns out that is the result of areas being overrun by Sunnis and Shias. That and since the troop surge the rate of Iraqi's fleeing the country have increased.

But I'm sure you already knew all that.

fastom · 02-05-2008, 08:04 PM

Once you kill everybody the casualty rate falls to zero. They are just playing with numbers. How many US troops actually came back dead... not what numbers do they report? I've heard it's more like 10,000 than 3,000.

Baraka_Guru · 02-05-2008, 08:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Polar

Even CNN reported (finally) that civilian casualties are down 80% and coalition casualites are down 85%.

Harry Ried, who declared the Surge a failure before all the troops were even on the ground has now changed his tune and stated the Surge is working.

Only those plugging their ears and going "LALALALALALALALALA" would think the Surge isn't doing exactly what it was designed to do.

I hadn't posted in this thread yet, but I think I will now in response to something like this.

I'm generally in the camp who thinks that the surge isn't really working (at least not in the way people had hoped). I'm sure these extra personnel aren't just standing around, but they aren't having the effect people think they are.

The surge might seem to be working only if you look at the big picture (i.e. the casualty statistics, etc.). But the camp I'm in acknowledges the fact that there are around 2 million Iraqis displaced within the country, and another 2 million displaced outside. What we are seeing is ethnic cleansing (not to be confused with genocide) actually working. There are some areas where the minority has become the majority because of this displacement, and there is little evidence that this will ever revert. There are stories of families returning, but these are exaggerated.

The surge likely isn't working. The surge is likely something that was too little, too late. If there's anything that is working, it is ethnic cleansing and tribalism. When you continue to separate people who hate one another, they tend to kill each other at a slower pace.

Iraq is broken. The Americans cannot fix it militarily.

loquitur · 02-06-2008, 10:31 AM

Iraq has roughly the same kind of reconciliation that the Bosnians and Kosovars have. Except that Tito wasn't as bloodthirsty as Saddam was, and he died in peace, which meant his country disintegrated in slow motion.

dc_dux · 02-06-2008, 10:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by loquitur

Iraq has roughly the same kind of reconciliation that the Bosnians and Kosovars have. Except that Tito wasn't as bloodthirsty as Saddam was, and he died in peace, which meant his country disintegrated in slow motion.

If that is the case, and I dont agree it is, then how will the continued US military presence lead to a political solution?

hiredgun · 02-07-2008, 09:15 AM

This is a big question and deserves serious answers, many of which I've glimpsed above.

That the number of casualties - including both civilians and US/Iraqi military - has dropped very significantly in the last year is beyond doubt. I will grab more stats on this later if I get a chance after work, as I recall seeing some nice graphs. The number of attack videos released by the insurgent groups' various media arms has also decreased dramatically... from one or two a day to a handful per week.

That said, there are a lot of reasons why we might have seen this happen.

1) The surge - not so much the increase in troops, but the tactical shift on the ground and the implementation of the Petraeus strategy. I will admit straight away that we probably owe some portion of the drop in violence to this plan.

2) Sadr sitting out - the Mahdi army has been in a unilateral ceasefire and has been sitting on the sidelines, for reasons that are not a hundred percent clear at this point. Most likely they are either tired and resource-limited and using the time to regroup, or they are waiting to see which way the political winds will blow. Or, perhaps, they are receiving orders from...

3) Iran. Contrary to popular belief, the administration has in fact been talking quietly with the Iranians, through intermediaries and directly. No solution in Iraq will be complete without giving the Iranians a stake in it. It is likely that the Iranians have slowed the flow of weapons and cash over the Iranian border into the hands of Iraqi militants (mostly Shi'a but at one point also Sunni). Some circumstantial evidence of this is the drop in the number of EFPs relative to other IEDs, as the technology for EFPs was said to have come from Iran (although more recently, US military have uncovered a number of small plants producing EFP linings inside of Iraq).

4) The completion of ethnic cleansing. Iraqi neighborhoods - particularly in urban areas like Baghdad that were once quite mixed - have been cleansed to a horrific degree. This is what most of the violence in the 2005-2006 period was about. Once these neighborhoods had been 'cleaned', the violence was likely to drop because many of the country's urban areas were now broken into little Sunni or Shia enclaves controlled by armed teenagers and thugs with makeshift checkpoints.

It is true that Falluja, Anbar, and other locations have been almost completely pacified, and that is a success story that I don't mean to diminish. At the same time, it is frustrating to see that when the insurgency is eliminated in one area, more often than not it simply moves somewhere else (currently, Diyala province).

Another thing to consider is the shape of the new Iraq that is emerging under the surge. While more pacified, it is farther away, not closer, to the image of a stable, democratic Iraq that has been our goal. One has to consider, then, that while it is certainly worth a sigh of relief that the sheer brutal violence has dropped, it is not clear that we are any closer to being out of the woods because the surge has not succeeded in bringing political reconciliation (which was one of its original goals).

This means that when we leave, one or both of the following are likely to happen:

1 - Enemies that have been laying low (e.g. Sadr's Mahdi army) will re-emerge in force.
2 - Our erstwhile allies will turn on each other because there is no political consensus yet (I cannot overstate this point. The Kurds are a breath away from leaving. Urban areas in the center and south are broken into sectarian enclaves controlled by gangs, except where the US has a strong presence. The prevailing political situation in Iraq is characterized by anarchy.)

Could this form an argument against withdrawal from Iraq? Perhaps. An argument against the effectiveness of the surge? Perhaps. You can make of it what you will, but it is my honest (and, I think, fairly accurate) assessment of where Iraq is right now.

Necrosis · 02-07-2008, 09:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

You beat me to it Sever.

Sadly a 'victory' in Iraq is the last thing the American left wants <span style="text-decoration: line-through;">right now</span> at any time, for obvious reasons.

Fixed.

Willravel · 02-07-2008, 10:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Necrosis

Fixed.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

Sadly a 'victory' in Iraq is something the left was never stupid enough to believe in.

Fixed for real.

Ustwo · 02-17-2008, 10:06 PM

http://www.reuters.com/article/world...Name=worldNews

Attacks in Baghdad fall 80 percent: Iraq military

The U.S. military says attacks have fallen across Iraq by 60 percent since June

Its too long an article to link directly, but you know, just saying....

Maybe you don't like Bush, maybe you don't like the war, etc, but SOMETHING seems to be working for the better.

Edit: And a belated thanks to hiredgun, always like to read your insight on all this.

dc_dux · 02-17-2008, 10:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

Maybe you don't like Bush, maybe you don't like the war, etc, but SOMETHING seems to be working for the better.

How is it better that nearly 4 million people have fled from Baghdad in the last 4 years....2 million to Syria, Lebanon and Jordan and just under 2 million to other "safer" havens within Iraq?

Or that Baghdad is becoming a walled city, segregated by religious sect?

Or that the US is arming Sunni "citizen militias" to patrol some neighborhoods in Baghdad against the wishes of the government?

All of these factors, along with the surge, account for the drop in civilian casualties.

Ustwo · 02-17-2008, 10:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dc_dux

How is it better that nearly 4 million people have fled from Baghdad in the last 4 years....2 million to Syria, Lebanon and Jordan and just under 2 million to other "safer" havens within Iraq?

Or that Baghdad is becoming a walled city, segregated by religious sect?

Or that the US is arming Sunni "citizen militias" against the wishes of the government?

You didn't read the article, did you, just admit it.

Quote:

"He wanted ... to send a message to the terrorists that security in Baghdad is prevailing now," one official said.

Central to the success has been the erection of 12-foot (3.5-meter) high concrete walls that snake across the city.

The walls were designed to stop car bombings blamed on al Qaeda that turned markets and open areas into killing fields.

Qanbar said he hoped the walls could be taken down "in the coming months" and predicted the improved situation in Baghdad would translate to greater security elsewhere.

Just buck it up and say 'yea things are a little better but...blah blah blah'.

IS it so damn hard for some of you to admit SOMETHING might be working in Iraq, it doesn't mean you have to support the war, just a little intellectual honesty.

dc_dux · 02-17-2008, 10:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

Edit: And a belated thanks to hiredgun, always like to read your insight on all this.

I agree....particularly with these observations:

2) Sadr sitting out - the Mahdi army has been in a unilateral ceasefire and has been sitting on the sidelines, for reasons that are not a hundred percent clear at this point. Most likely they are either tired and resource-limited and using the time to regroup, or they are waiting to see which way the political winds will blow. Or, perhaps, they are receiving orders from...

4) The completion of ethnic cleansing. Iraqi neighborhoods - particularly in urban areas like Baghdad that were once quite mixed - have been cleansed to a horrific degree. This is what most of the violence in the 2005-2006 period was about. Once these neighborhoods had been 'cleaned', the violence was likely to drop because many of the country's urban areas were now broken into little Sunni or Shia enclaves controlled by armed teenagers and thugs with makeshift checkpoints.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

You didn't read the article, did you, just admit it.

Just buck it up and say 'yea things are a little better but...blah blah blah'.

IS it so damn hard for some of you to admit SOMETHING might be working in Iraq, it doesn't mean you have to support the war, just a little intellectual honesty.

Nope...I havent read that article, but I am confident that I am as well read on developments in Iraq as you.

So where is the political progress that this surge was supposed to bring about?

Is it so damn hard to admit that political reconcilliation wont come about as a result of a continued US occupation?

Ustwo · 02-17-2008, 10:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dc_dux

Nope...I havent read that article, but I am confident that I am as well read in developments in Iraq as you.

Then why did you post? I mean if you want to start shouting about how its not working I'd expect you at least to take a quick look to see what it was that was posted.

I guess I can't expect more form interweb posters when we have Nancy Pelosi saying the surge has failed, BUT the troops have succeeded AND that they need to be 'honorably redeployed' (aka retreat).

When the democrat house leader is so full of double speak that George Orwell is doing 360's in his coffin, I suppose I can't expect more from like minds here.

dc_dux · 02-17-2008, 10:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

Then why did you post? I mean if you want to start shouting about how its not working I'd expect you at least to take a quick look to see what it was that was posted.

OK...I just read it and I wouldnt change a word of my post attributing the drop in violence in Baghdad to many factors. (But just for the record, ask yourself how many posts of mine or host's or others you have commented on without reading the linked article...methinks there is a whif of a double standard in the words/deeds of one self righteous interweb poster)

So why do you think a continued US presence against the wishes of much of the Iraqi parliament and an overwhelming majority of the Iraqi people will lead to political reconciliation?....or at the very least, a functioning central government?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

When the democrat house leader is so full of double speak that George Orwell is doing 360's in his coffin, I suppose I can't expect more from like minds here.

I would suggest that the WH and neo-con collection of talking points before the invasion and throughout the occupation is the real Orwellian doublespeak... from which they are unable to find any way out of the fucked-up quagmire they created other than "stay the course" (2005) or "stay the course - the sequel" (2006) or "stay the course redux- the third time is a charm - the surge is working" (2007 - ?)

01-12-2008, 05:16 PM	#4 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	thing is, seaver, that in this kind of conflict, there are going to be spaces that are more or less active and times when they will and wont be as well--there's nothing like a consistent battle-line or any type of continuous engagement--so alot of bets are off in terms of assessment of that is happening overall based on anecdotal evidence. without meaning to trivialize anything, its almost like from an old-school military strategy perspective, this war is entirely anecdotal. so what i think is in that particular sector, the goal of the offensive or "surge" worked, but it's not obvious how--these particular folk might be sitting around alot, but you can't tell if this follows from a "win" in the sense of much meaningful destruction of an enemy the americans can actually find on a consistent basis, or if they simply moved. the writer of the article doesn't know either way and draws no conclusions from this particular situation. fact is that it's hard to make any global assessments. casualty rates overall indicate that the fighting is diffuse but continuous, more or less---so that's one. assessments of what if going on in general that do not originate with the american press pool paint a darker picture than the article you bit above, which does come from the pool. what you rarely get in the america press--fed to the pool--is anything that even appears to be a rational assessment of the overall situation. what the press has become, in the context of the press pool, is a marketing relay system that links pentagon-cleared infotainment to press outlets to a public. and then you have a contextual change in that turkey appears to be already making forays into kurdish territory in the north and is gearing up for a larger operation maybe, so that'll tank the situation in kurdistan. but seriously, it's hard to feel as though we as merely the public have information reliable or comprehensive enough to know anything--we can assemble information that gives a sense of it, but there are always mitigating factors that can be introduced--so it comes down in a strange way to what you want to see. and it's at this point that judgments become difficult: if you opposed the war, is there a level of vindication to be had from assembling a negative image? does that mean then that you are treating violence as a source of pleasure/confirmation? or if you supported the war, does the contrary hold? and if that's the case, do parallel a prior committments cause you to not look at information to the contrary? i dont say this because i have a secret card to introduce at the end that will reveal all--i say it because i think this is pretty much the position the ongoing informational and political management process has put us in. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

01-12-2008, 05:29 PM	#9 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	i wouldn't normally do this, but there is a more productive way to manage this discussion than falling directly into this republicans-versus-everybody else kinda thing or it's inverse. i tried to outline why above--i'll just repeat it here: a. from a vertically organized military viewpoint, this is an "unconventional war" so the traditional ways of measuring what happened and why are not operative--no more in iraq than in vietnam (remember the daily body count?) despite the self-evident differences between the situations. b. the article in the op makes NO judgements as to WHY things are calm for this particular batallion. so it provides NO basis for making stuff up about why the situation obtains. seaver at least brought up the obvious next move--try to find a way to generalize from this--but it's not terribly informative as an index. it just isn't. think about it. c. then there is the problem of information management, marketing war, etc etc etc. d. then there is the problem of where and how you might get information that might actually BE informative about the general situation. e. but because the information is so scattered and comes from a wide range of sources, any of us can fall into the game of projection with a few arbitrary references draped around it. you know, politics as 'just my opinion man"--this shows why that's worthless yet again. this last point is a problem and we are all wasting our time talking about iraq right now unless we acknowledge it. but doing that would make it less easy to take facile shots at each other. so maybe it's a good idea to head that way. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

01-12-2008, 06:02 PM	#10 (permalink)
Elphaba Deja Moo Location: Olympic Peninsula, WA	The purpose of the surge was to provide the "breathing space" needed that would allow the Iraqi government to achieve specific goals. The government has further fractured over the period of the surge and has ceased to be functional in any meaningful way. It should also be noted that al-Sadr has ordered his Mahdi Army to stand down temporarily and I think some of the reduction in conflict can be credited to that. Our occupation of Iraq has more to do with the ongoing insurgency than any surge is able to resolve. What is the "victory" we hope to achieve, if we are the source of the problem? __________________ "You can't ignore politics, no matter how much you'd like to." Molly Ivins - 1944-2007

01-12-2008, 06:28 PM	#12 (permalink)
Plan9 I Confess a Shiver	*watches more US Marines deploy to Afghanistan in another "Surge" strategy* __________________ *Whatever you can carry.* "You should not drink... and bake."

01-12-2008, 06:41 PM	#13 (permalink)
Seaver Junkie Location: Fort Worth, TX	Very Valid points RB, but if you want to take a military historian perspective you can't compare Iraq to Vietnam quite that easily. Iraq was a counter-insurgency after the 2nd week of the war effectively. There was no military infrastructure, little or no chain of command, and no battle lines. Vietnam constantly switched back and forth between counter-insurgencies and traditional military conflict. Contrary to popular belief that last statement was true. Every time it switched to traditional military conflict we massacred the Vietnamese. The Tet Offensive, though potrayed as a disaster by the news (nice parallel to your argument), was a complete military success. The reason I bring this up is counter-insurgencies and traditional military conflicts are fought with completely different tactics, and have wildly different outcomes. Closer parallels to these are the British in Burma (or the Gurkas) or us in the Philippeans. Counter-Insurgencies have always lasted around 10 years, ending with either exhaustion of the enemies or further incorporation and empowerment of said group into the central government. That is a major reason for your article (which I was aware of, just left out) that I see as no big deal is because it satisfies the second of the prior listing. Yes we are empowering members of a group we just wiped out, however their power is SEVERELY limited and in my opinion is acceptable if it lowers violence. With less than a handful of those prior Ba'ath party members involved in the government, we have won over their family and most likely their entire tribe to supporting the government. All of a sudden we have made a large ally for a small price. I agree it's hard to gauge, which is why I keep pointing to Murtha. A man who is so strongly opposed to the war from day one is openly stating it is on the mend. I have no doubt he has better access than us to information across the board, and even he has come to believe in the success where no one can say he's just cow-towing to the administration. __________________ "Smite the rocks with the rod of knowledge, and fountains of unstinted wealth will gush forth." - Ashbel Smith as he laid the first cornerstone of the University of Texas

01-12-2008, 08:06 PM	#15 (permalink)
loquitur Junkie Location: NYC	actually, ratbastid, I think it depends how you define the "surge." Is it jsut the increase in manpower or the change in command and strategy that called for the increased manpower? It seems obvious (to me, at least) that changing to a more population-based strategy under a counter-insurgency expert (Petraeus) has enabled the US military to react more flexibly and creatively, and to take advantage of the opportunity presented by the sheikhs reasserting their authority when AQI overstepped its bounds and got the population pissed off at them. I wouldn't say it's the only cause, but clearly it has contributed mightily to the increasing stabilization of the country, the return of refugees, the improving economy, etc, etc, etc. A lot of that is also the Iraqis themselves getting tired of the ongoing instability.

01-13-2008, 06:29 AM	#19 (permalink)
Kadath Muffled Location: Camazotz	Let me ask; does saying the Surge is working imply tacit approval of the entire war/the administration's foreign policy? Does it justify going to war in the first place? __________________ it's quiet in here

01-13-2008, 09:06 AM	#20 (permalink)
loquitur Junkie Location: NYC	ratbastid, if you believe as I do that "surge" was a misnomer, then yes, the surge is working. The additional troops were requested as a result of a new strategy being implemented, not vice versa. Not incidentally, that is an indictment of the prior strategy and the people who implemented it. People need to learn from history: the current strategy is more of an Abrams strategy, whereas the prior one was more of a Westmoreland strategy. You'd think that would have been accounted for in the planning, but apparently it wasn't. Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it. And in this case, we lost three years and thousands of precious lives.

01-13-2008, 10:44 AM	#21 (permalink)
ASU2003 immoral minority Location: Back in Ohio	I will say it appears to be getting better. But, I have no idea on what is going on over there. It could be that they are taking a break and only randomly fighting until a future US president just pulls out. Then the Shiia/Sunni will try for a major power grab. If McCain becomes president (and we stay in) and the situation is peaceful in 2010, I'll be convinced that we could start making plans for a controlled withdrawal. With the assumption that if things deteriorate, that we would stay longer.

01-13-2008, 04:09 PM	#22 (permalink)
Rekna Junkie	Seaver your post is so miss informed it doesn't suit you well. First Murtha did not say the surge is working, look at the whole quote. He said some aspects of it is working but the purpose was to provide space for the government to make progress which it has not done. Which means it has failed. It is expected that if we put in more troops the violence would go down but if we removed the troops again what would happen? Also Anbar province is not where the surge took place and its security improvements is a result of the tribal leaders turning on Iraq not the surge.

02-05-2008, 01:37 PM	#25 (permalink)
Polar Upright	Even CNN reported (finally) that civilian casualties are down 80% and coalition casualites are down 85%. Harry Ried, who declared the Surge a failure before all the troops were even on the ground has now changed his tune and stated the Surge is working. Only those plugging their ears and going "LALALALALALALALALA" would think the Surge isn't doing exactly what it was designed to do.

02-05-2008, 02:09 PM	#26 (permalink)
pr0f3n Crazy Location: a little to the right	Right, if we push the bar low enough, everyone wins. Just like when recruitment numbers were down, we started recruiting drunks, convicts and retirees. Or when the army stopped reporting bombing deaths as combat casualties. That must be some tasty kool-aid. keke ^__^ ggnewmap __________________ In heaven all the interesting people are missing. Friedrich Nietzsche

02-05-2008, 08:04 PM	#28 (permalink)
fastom Psycho Location: way out west	Once you kill everybody the casualty rate falls to zero. They are just playing with numbers. How many US troops actually came back dead... not what numbers do they report? I've heard it's more like 10,000 than 3,000.

02-06-2008, 10:31 AM	#30 (permalink)
loquitur Junkie Location: NYC	Iraq has roughly the same kind of reconciliation that the Bosnians and Kosovars have. Except that Tito wasn't as bloodthirsty as Saddam was, and he died in peace, which meant his country disintegrated in slow motion.

02-07-2008, 09:15 AM	#32 (permalink)
hiredgun Addict	This is a big question and deserves serious answers, many of which I've glimpsed above. That the number of casualties - including both civilians and US/Iraqi military - has dropped very significantly in the last year is beyond doubt. I will grab more stats on this later if I get a chance after work, as I recall seeing some nice graphs. The number of attack videos released by the insurgent groups' various media arms has also decreased dramatically... from one or two a day to a handful per week. That said, there are a lot of reasons why we might have seen this happen. 1) The surge - not so much the increase in troops, but the tactical shift on the ground and the implementation of the Petraeus strategy. I will admit straight away that we probably owe some portion of the drop in violence to this plan. 2) Sadr sitting out - the Mahdi army has been in a unilateral ceasefire and has been sitting on the sidelines, for reasons that are not a hundred percent clear at this point. Most likely they are either tired and resource-limited and using the time to regroup, or they are waiting to see which way the political winds will blow. Or, perhaps, they are receiving orders from... 3) Iran. Contrary to popular belief, the administration has in fact been talking quietly with the Iranians, through intermediaries and directly. No solution in Iraq will be complete without giving the Iranians a stake in it. It is likely that the Iranians have slowed the flow of weapons and cash over the Iranian border into the hands of Iraqi militants (mostly Shi'a but at one point also Sunni). Some circumstantial evidence of this is the drop in the number of EFPs relative to other IEDs, as the technology for EFPs was said to have come from Iran (although more recently, US military have uncovered a number of small plants producing EFP linings inside of Iraq). 4) The completion of ethnic cleansing. Iraqi neighborhoods - particularly in urban areas like Baghdad that were once quite mixed - have been cleansed to a horrific degree. This is what most of the violence in the 2005-2006 period was about. Once these neighborhoods had been 'cleaned', the violence was likely to drop because many of the country's urban areas were now broken into little Sunni or Shia enclaves controlled by armed teenagers and thugs with makeshift checkpoints. It is true that Falluja, Anbar, and other locations have been almost completely pacified, and that is a success story that I don't mean to diminish. At the same time, it is frustrating to see that when the insurgency is eliminated in one area, more often than not it simply moves somewhere else (currently, Diyala province). Another thing to consider is the shape of the new Iraq that is emerging under the surge. While more pacified, it is farther away, not closer, to the image of a stable, democratic Iraq that has been our goal. One has to consider, then, that while it is certainly worth a sigh of relief that the sheer brutal violence has dropped, it is not clear that we are any closer to being out of the woods because the surge has not succeeded in bringing political reconciliation (which was one of its original goals). This means that when we leave, one or both of the following are likely to happen: 1 - Enemies that have been laying low (e.g. Sadr's Mahdi army) will re-emerge in force. 2 - Our erstwhile allies will turn on each other because there is no political consensus yet (I cannot overstate this point. The Kurds are a breath away from leaving. Urban areas in the center and south are broken into sectarian enclaves controlled by gangs, except where the US has a strong presence. The prevailing political situation in Iraq is characterized by anarchy.) Could this form an argument against withdrawal from Iraq? Perhaps. An argument against the effectiveness of the surge? Perhaps. You can make of it what you will, but it is my honest (and, I think, fairly accurate) assessment of where Iraq is right now.

02-17-2008, 10:06 PM	#35 (permalink)
Ustwo Pissing in the cornflakes	http://www.reuters.com/article/world...Name=worldNews Attacks in Baghdad fall 80 percent: Iraq military The U.S. military says attacks have fallen across Iraq by 60 percent since June Its too long an article to link directly, but you know, just saying.... Maybe you don't like Bush, maybe you don't like the war, etc, but SOMETHING seems to be working for the better. Edit: And a belated thanks to hiredgun, always like to read your insight on all this. __________________ Agents of the enemies who hold office in our own government, who attempt to eliminate our "freedoms" and our "right to know" are posting among us, I fear.....on this very forum. - host Obama - Know a Man by the friends he keeps. Last edited by Ustwo; 02-17-2008 at 10:13 PM..