What of the Surge? (and a Green Alligator Update)
Yeah. How’s that surge coming along?
Well, fewer things are going boom in Iraq these days – a lot fewer. Put that one in the overflowing “Surge Working” basket.
“Ah, but that political scene – that’s the real loser”, sayeth my lefty friends, as they twist themselves in pretzelly shapes trying to get out of the blinding glare of the cloud’s silver lining.
“Mayhap”, I’ll reply. “But it’s mighty hard to build a democracy with the rocket’s red glare and bombs bursting in air happening right outside your front porch. After all, six years passed between our own Treaty of Paris and a ratified Constitution.”
“US OUT OF IRAQ!”, they’ll yell in reply. I don’t think they’d hear anything else I might say about stability being the first ingredient in the political stew nor of how the Iraqis are starting to clearly see who their enemies really are because they spend so much time seeing us not being their enemies. Shame, really.
UPDATE: Says Michael Yon, who has some expertise in the matter:
To say there has been no political progress in Iraq in 2007 is patently absurd, completely wrong and dangerously dismissive of the significant changes and improvements happening all across Iraq. Whether or not Americans are seeing it on the nightly news or reading it in their local papers, Iraqis are actively writing their children’s history.
Read the rest to see exactly what he’s talking about.
I wonder if there will be a reasoned response or if the anti-war left will simply assault Yon’s character as they’ve done numerous times in the past to others who bring good news about Iraq.
It’s a shame that they want us to lose as badly as they do. No amount of “It’s not my war” will insulate them from the effects of a loss in Iraq. The Islamists could care less if they have a “Kerry in ’04″ sticker on their car. They can saw the head off of an anti-war protestor just as easily as they can a so-called warmonger. What’s more, they don’t care to notice the difference.
No related posts.
Category: Fighting the Islamists
That group that uou call "my lefty friends" does that include just the hard corps commies or does include the 200 million Americans who want an end to the war ?
Since things are going so well when are the troops coming home?
Keep drinkin' the ol' kool aid. Either you've been fooled by The Bush Crime Family or you're a whore for them. Which is it?
And here come the zombies now…
Notice what has dropped: "high-profile attacks." Not "attacks." Not "casualties." That's a strange way to parse data — what's the threshhold that makes an attack "high-profile"?
I want to believe, but where are the statistics? I can't find data on the MNF Web site. Anyone got the numbers?
Jimmie-
Really, what do you expect, with a "drive by" post linking to USA Today? Here's a tip, restrict posts based on the USA Today to Sports and Weird News.
Plus, your site has no comment preview, so who would want to spent much time refuting your opinion without the ability to preview before posting?
But hey, I will take a shot at posting an embedded link without the benefit of preview:
Instead of grazing on cupcakes, try introducing your palate to some some expert analysis.
So we've gone from:
"Mission Accomplished"
to
"The Insurgency is on its last legs"
to
"Major bombings are not quite as frequent as they were a few months ago (but still much higher than three years ago)."
And we are supposed to hand over another blank check to George W. Bush so he can continue to run out the clock to January 2009, declaring he "was on the road to victory"?
I do not believe Bush's war in Iraq is winnable any more. The President and his kleptocrats have screwed it up too much to be repaired, especially not by George W. Bush himself.
Bush has a long history of firing anyone who does not make the public announcements he likes to hear. From
"It will take several hundred thousand troops to occupy Iraq"
to
"The occupation will cost more than $60 billion".
to
"The surge is not the key to peace in Iraq".
Telling the truth has been the quickest way to get to "Spend more time with your family".
I have no more faith in current rosy scenarios and projections that I have in any of the previous "The next six months will be crucial" lines we have heard.
And, for the record, I do not "Hate America". I am not "Rooting for the Terrorists to win (they already have, from the moment Donald Rumsfeld botched the occupation)."
In fact, in my opinion, the ones who truly "Hate the troops" are the ones who are willing to back continued death and dismemberment of our soldiers, just so they can "Stay the Course" in Iraq while George w. Bush runs out the clock and avoids having to publicly admit his failures as Commander in Chief.
Allowing our soldiers to die, just to protect the inflated ego of one person (Bush) is REALLY an indication of hating our troops.
some facts would help your argument about improvment in the political front in iraq. we are now paying sunni militias to do what we refused to pay for two years ago. Maliki is kissing ass in Tehran and Bush is left with trying to make another tenuous connection between al Qaeda and Iraq. as for less things going boom… happens every summer (how sad it is that we have so much data to compare) cause explosive making in high heat is very dangerous.
Blinded by the silver lining? Excuse me? It was Bush who argued that this surge was not an "escalation," but a "surge" — a temporary increase in military force to secure the country enough to let the goverment become secure by September. Since obviously all of that is untrue, or at least has failed, as all other strategies of this administration have failed, where is the silver lining? Are you seriously arguing that the failure of this surge is a success as an escalation of military force? Then when does it end? What is the new goalpost? How much more money? How many more lives? And any guarentees that if the administration fails to meet these new goalposts the country will finally get a different strategy?
Please, we'd all like to know! What is the difference between your support of this surge and simply a mindless obedience to whatever this administration tells you?
Jimmie.
Bush's presidency is devolving into an extended holding action to the last second of his presidency helped by enabelers like you.
On all fronts indeed he appears to be holding on delaying the inevitable, unless he and you believe that victory can be achieved with 150,000 troops in Iraq. The same amount of troops that has been in Iraq for years, as surges come and go trough the times.
You know Jimmie, Donald Rummsfeld, the former Neo-Con Secretary of Defense from hell, once described the Iraqi Insurgents as a "Few dead-enders who refuse to acknowledge that the world around them had changed".
How ironic it is to see now Rumsfeld gone in disgrace, and the Right Wing and Neo-Cons so desperate that they are actually prising the new alliance that Gen. Petraeus and those same "dead enders", the Sunni trival Insurget Leaders are forming to fight al-Quiada. That's your great news? Is that how low you have gone? That's sad people.
How ironic that increasingly and obviosly the dead-ender phrase can be applied as a self- portrait of the Bush Administration, and all Neo Cons, and Right Wingers out there.
Right WIng and Neo-Con policies for the most part are on life support. The Neo Con idea of pre-emptive invasions, and the entire rational used to invade Iraq is now in absolute desripute. Neo-Cons, once Bush lives office will never, ever again will gain power thank God. They are the political equivalent of a terminal cancer patient waiting for his time to die.
As for the Right Wing agenda, is for the most part in the same shape. Stem Cell research will proceed once Bush goes to Crowford. The majority of Republicans, and Democrats support loosing restrains for federal funding. Stem Cell research fully supported by the Federal Government will be a reality by 2009, that's an undeniable fact.
Global Warming is another issue where the Right will simply be left behind by history.
I can go on with the list, but I believe I made my point clear enough Jimmie.
When Ruumy mentioned dead-enders little did he know how things would turn out for you all.
Well, well, well; every single comment on this thread simply rips this nonsensical Republican propaganda to shreds. Apparently, all but the most fanatical neocon warmongers have tired of this idiotic charade, just as they are sure to do, incidentally, of the equally absurd pretense that a Republican has any prayer in hell of being elected president in 2008.
You can beg and whine all you want; this war isn't an American war, it's a REPUBLICAN war — George Bush's war, to be precise — and now it's done. All that's left to do is to kick around the rotting carcases of Karl Rove, Alberto Gonzales, and the gang for another year-and-a-half, then bring the troops home once our most recent national nightmare comes to an end. Meanwhile, you can make yourself happy by squealing "traitor, defeatist, appeasement, surrender," etc., etc. etc, as the rest of the country laughs in your face and drives a stake through the heart of 'Dolph "Nosferatu" Guiliani, as well as that of the bloodsucker to whom he's married, Judi Guiliani.
You talk a lot about your lefty friends, and they all seem to be posting. Do you have any righty friends?
What I don't understand, you're a loyal Bush soldier even as he's putting a bullet in the head of the conservative movement in America. Time to reassess your loyalties, maybe think a little for yourself.
The reporter in Iraq strongly disagrees with all of you. I think I'll go with his assessment, thanks.
You're making the same mistake that helped get us into this thing in the first place. The reporter is reporting numbers, and I quote:
"according to the U.S. military command in Iraq."
Where's the independent confirmation? Better yet, where are the actual numbers? It would be interesting to see if the last few months have been safer everywhere, or safer in relation to similar months in previous years, or safer at all. Fewer "big bombs" is meaningless if there have been a lot of little bombs instead.
I'll ask again… I've been looking for stats, but I can't find them. Does anyone know where some raw data can be found?
Jimmie.
"Fewer and fewer things are going boom in Iraq these days, a lot fewer"
You might want to turn on your TV and see the news comming out from Iraq today.
At least 175 dead and hundreds of wounded in 4 attacks in Northern Iraq. The part of Iraq that was supposed to be peaceful.
You know Jimmie, at this late stage of our ocupation (almost five years) it should be crystal clear to even the most fanatical Bush supporter that playing "guacamole" with the insurgents and militias, does not work.
Do you have any idea how you sound just about now with your claims? Sorry, bad timing for your blog.
Jimmie a friendly piece of advice. You might want to try to ask your representatives to change policies in Iraq while they still can. Is not the end of the world you know. But it will be the end of your party if you guys insist in continuing supporting Bush's policies of "stay the course" by another name now called "the surge".
Jimmie,
You said, "After all, six years passed between our own Treaty of Paris and a ratified Constitution."
Luckily, the occupying force (the British) left the US after the Treaty of Paris and the Framers were then free to debate the rights we now enjoy today.
Imagine if the Redcoats had stayed after signing the Treaty of Paris, do you think things would have turned out the same?
quisp – And still it took us six years to work out a democracy.
Let me sharpen up your analogy a bit. Imagine if, after the Treaty of Paris, our nascent democracy was immediately assaulted by small groups of soldiers operating out of Canada, trained and equipped by the British? Then imagine our young country's churches, markets, and schools being attacked regularly by a group of American Indians funded not only by the British but by several other sympathetic governments. Do you think that any friendly foreign troops who were in the United States might well have been welcome to help us. I certainly do (and, if I'm not mistaken, they were for a short while).
"Well, fewer things are going boom in Iraq these days – a lot fewer."
200 people killed by bombs in one day… are you insane?
Is your post satire? The "want to lose" tripe was so 2004. It must be terribly embarrassing to post your drivel which shares the same timing with the recent carnage in Iraqmire: 200 killed & 300 wounded in the recent car bombing, the 10 soldiers killed yesterday, or the McClatchy report about 'U.S. military officers are offering a bleak picture of Iraq’s future, saying they’ve yet to see any signs of reconciliation between Sunni and Shiite Muslims despite the drop in violence.', 'U.S. officials say the number of civilian casualties in the Iraqi capital is down 50 percent. But U.S. officials declined to provide specific numbers, and statistics gathered by McClatchy Newspapers don't support the claim.' , 'The number of car bombings in July actually was 5 percent higher than the number recorded last December, according to the McClatchy statistics, and the number of civilians killed in explosions is about the same.'
But keep cheerleading oh Uber-patriot tool you.
Forget the Consitution. I'd be happy if Iraq could even put up the Articles of Confederation!
From the McClatchy article. Here's one of the "bleak pictures".
And "if…then" statement is not a "bleak outlook". It's an honest assessment of a possible future. There are many possible futures, only one of which is that which Col. Green described. I am quite sure that he acknowledges that other futures are just as possible, just as any rational person would.
As Yon noted, there is political progress being made in Iraq. It's not happening in Baghdad, though, so it's not getting the attention of the reporters who hang out in their Green Zone hotels all the time. Yon has seen it happening in cities and villages in his travels. So has Michael Totten. So has Ullrich Fichtner.
The thing is, as I've mentioned before, demcoracy isn't a top-down process. It never really has been. Where the Bush administration has failed is in believing that it could be so in Iraq. General Petraeus has seen what happens when the Iraqis get enough peace to be able to work out their own governance, though, and that is exactly why he's going to recommend our continued vigorous pursuit of al-Qaeda and the Iranian interlopers. The more of them we kill and chase away, the more the Iraqis sort out their politics.
It will be some time before a full national government comes about, I'd say, and that's not a surprise. it took us six years to do it and we didn't spend a few decades being traumatized by a genocidal killer.
Totten, of the OHanlan-style Iraq-vested writers guild: in an article for the conservative FrontPage Magazine.com entitled "A Liberal's Case for Bush's War" wrote[1] "If you don't join us now, when Saddam's regime falls and Iraqis cheer the US Marines, you are really going to feel like a jackass. … The liberation of Iraq and the democratic transformation of the Middle East is the most progressive cause in the world today. It is the right side of history, and if you stand in the way or sit on the sidelines, your liberal humanitarian credentials are toast." Cant say i know much of Fitchner and Yon, but i worry i'd find similar vested interests… much like "war critics" OHanlan and friend.
Just days ago one Sunni faction of the Iraq gubmint was charging the AlMalaki-led Iran-friendly Shia majority gubmnint with ethnic cleansing, after that faction quit the govmnt. Positions like this dont bode well for political progress. I think info like this would be important for readers here when the discussion of political progress is bantied about.
And the fact that reporters have to 'hang out in the greenzone hotels all the time' is indicative of dis-progress.