WHAT'S GOING ON?

"It's clear by now that playing for time is the real
White House strategy for Iraq," writes Eugene
Robinson (ER) in today's Washington Post. Notice,
that is not a strategy for winning in Iraq, as has
always been the claim, the impossible dream!
"Gen. David Petraeus probably won the respite Bush
wanted," ER continues, "when he said that U. S.
military objectives 'are in a large measure being met.'"

They aren't, of course: Shia on Shia violence has
increased markedly, particularly in southern Iraq,
where the militias are fighting among themselves
and with each other. But we don't count those
intramural casualties in our reports. They don't
make it into our database. Also, we don't count
crime figures, which remain high. If someone is shot
in the front of the head, that's criminal activity, and
not counted in our stats. If they are shot in the back
of the head, that's sectarian violence, and those are
down in Baghdad, because the ethnic cleansing there
is pretty much a finished job. Baghdad used to be 65%
Sunni. It is now 75% Shia. The refugees driven out are
almost all Sunni, and like the Terminator, "they'll be
back." Attributing reduced sectarian violence in
Baghdad to the surge commits the fallacy of post hoc,
ergo propter hoc.

The only real, verifiable reduction in violence in Iraq
is taking place in Anbar, where the natives themselves
have taken the initiative and turned against al Qaeda.
They did this on their own, well before the surge got
under way, and not on account of it. It's a most
welcome development, of course, and our forces are
giving substantial and important support. Bush and
his supporters are claiming success in Anbar as proof
the surge is working. Hillary Clinton and Katie Couric
are among the many falling for this bogus connection.

But back to the good general's claim that our military
objectives are "in large measure" being met. ER
comments: "Never mind whether those objectives
make sense." And of course, they've never been
clearly defined. They keep changing. We can't blame
the general for that. Nor can we blame him for using
contradictory and misleading numbers. He gets those
from the Pentagon, and passes them on to us. I see
Gen. Petraeus as a brave, honorable, highly motivated
and talented man. I admire him greatly, and am
grateful for his service to the country.

Our media, by and large, continue to publish govern-
ment figures without question or verification, as they
have from the beginning of this war. An important
exception is the Mc Clatchy Newspapers, who have
consistently dug for and published the facts. Here is
what they say about Iraq: "Civilian deaths haven't
decreased in any significant way across the country,
according to statistics from the Iraqi Ministry of the
Interior." Numbers gathered by Mc Clatchy show
no consistent downward trend even in Baghdad,
despite assertions to the contrary. They report:
"Overall, civilian casualties in Iraq appear to have
remained steady throughout the surge, though
numbers are difficult to come by. . . . According
to the Interior Ministry, 984 people were killed
across Iraq in February (before the surge), and
1,011 died in violence in August (of this year)."
Services have also continued to deteriorate: 30%
of Iraqis have clean water. It was 50% in 2003.
30% of Iraqi children are malnourished, vs. 19%
before the U. S. invasion.

A funny thing about the security improvements
that Gen. Petraeus points to: it's news to the Iraqis!
In a poll of Iraqis commissioned by ABC News, the
BBC and the Japanese network NHK -- released
yesterday before the Petraeus testimony -- 31%
of Iraqis said security in their local areas had
worsened over the past six months, as opposed to
just 24% who said it had improved. A full 61% said
security had worsened in the country overall, vs.
only 11% who said it had gotten better.

Only 22% said things in general were going well in
Iraq (down from 44% in November 2005), and just
23% thought things would get better over the coming
year (as opposed to 69% in 2005). Some 63% of Iraqis
polled said the U. S. invasion was wrong, 47% said that
coalition forces "should leave now" and 57% said
attacks on U. S. forces were "acceptable." But "never
mind what Iraqis think," says ER: "On with the new
new strategy, which is to bypass the national govern-
ment and work from the bottom up, making deals
with local power brokers. That should be good for,
what, another six months?"

jgoodwin004@centurytel.net