Surge-a-riffic!

Whew... Good thing the Iraq war is over and everything is flower petals and glory to Dave Petraeus.

There are still people dying there every day, it's still killing U.S. troops at about 1 a day, its killing Iraqi's (those that are left) at much, much greater numbers.

Why are we still there?

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Counter Insurgency vs. The Surge

Phillip Carter's blog "Intel Dump" over that the Wapo (go figure!). Has a post about how this current tightening of the belt for the military in Iraq. By having to keep up the levels of the surge, Bush in another pointless presser about how he is working hard on Iraq told the press corp he was authorizing reducing the combat tour lengths to 7 months. Short tours are against COIN doctrine and the short tours in 'Nam were well known problem. Here is some of what Phil had to say:

Counterinsurgency requires detailed knowledge of the human, geographic, political and social terrain, and it takes time to acquire that knowledge. I'd say it became effective around the fifth or sixth month of my tour as a police adviser in Iraq. Arguably, advisers, commanders and troops operating outside the wire should serve longer tours in order to develop and cement their relationships, and capitalize on them.

But they can't -- there's a finite limit to the amount of combat that men and women can endure. So we must balance combat effectiveness, and the needs of an all-volunteer force (and its families), against the steep learning curve of counterinsurgency, which demands longer deployments. -- Intel Dump

Even when these guys eak out some minor, miniscule, tiny advantage they immediately think up some way to screw things up.

It's a real dilemma, and I'm not sure how to solve it without drastically increasing the size of the military or sharply curtailing the deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. -- Phil Carter, Intel Dump.

Keep dreaming Phil you crazy diamond!

Oh, and the body count is back up to almost 2 a day again. Booyah!

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Working The Surge

I would take some comfort from the crowing about the surge working on the right, if I didn't think that the chickenhawk military 'experts' only are concerned with the fact that they weren't wrong. They don't really give a damn whether the Iraqi's begin to govern themselves or it's safer there. They don't give damn if "we're winning". They just are concerned about losing and being proved wrong. Let's be honest this surge did nothing but stop the bleeding, if we had pulled out we would have saved hundreds of American lives and thousands of Iraqi.

It's not really clear if there would have been more Iraqi's dead if we have pulled out. Given the fact that violence is down in the south where we have pulled out, although still seeing 45 murders a day in Basra, the lesson is clear. Troops can't make a difference in that situation anymore. What is needed is more Iraqi police, especially ones that aren't in the pocket of the local militias.

For the military, it is clear to me that they are invested in this because it's military nature not to admit defeat. Never to give up the fight. That's why they fought to have the surge implemented in the first place, they knew time was running out on their strategy. They will never admit their defeat in this insurgency, regardless of the hand they were dealt by the Bush administration. They never really internalized the Vietnam loss, how could they realize this one, which is in its slow motion death throes even now.

The surge is working, in that it kept the people from forcing congress to withdraw. This was its only purpose. Petraeus' purpose was to stall the withdrawal, and that mission was accomplished.

Nothing has changed the dynamic in Iraq and civilian deaths are up 33%.

We would have less loss of life if we had withdrawn, and the situation in Iraq would not have changed. Except perhaps, as Basra teaches us, for the better.

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Turkey Shoot in Northern Iraq

Turkish ground forces have rolled across the border into northern Iraq to target Kurdish rebels said to be sheltering there.
Thousands of soldiers are thought to be involved in the operation which, the army says, began on Thursday evening after an air and artillery bombardment.

Turkey promised its force would "return home in the shortest time possible after its goals have been achieved".

The US military says it believes the operation is of limited duration. -- bbc.co.uk

The Russkies used to do this sort of thing. Probe for steel. The U.S. response here is unclear as of yet. They may have given a "we're not concerned" quote to the news agencies but lets wait and see if they push back hard. If they don't, expect a lot more 'excursions' by the Turks. This is all an indication of the strain on our forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. They can't handle more complications over there.

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The Surge is Working, IV.2

Yeah... right.

The media now say that Iraq is a secondary issue. But the voters, so far mostly on the Republican side, disagree. In New Hampshire last week, two-thirds of Republicans who voted in the primary told exit pollsters they support the war in Iraq. Oddly enough, they like the war more than they like President Bush.

For obvious reasons, McCain is the chief beneficiary of the surge effect. He has relentlessly promoted increasing the number of troops in Iraq and adopting a counterinsurgency strategy that stresses the protection and safety of Iraqi citizens. -- AP

Uhm... but... but...

Iraqi authorities have taken charge of reconstruction projects along with military operations in southern Iraq, establishing a major test of their ability to effectively manage the large sums of money involved.
-- Wired ,In Basra, Iraqis Go It Alone.

Except in the south, were we really couldn't give a shit. And the outlying provinces and suburbs of Baghdad, and parts of Baghdad, and that bit over there, but other than that!

Well, we are protecting Iraqi's by allowing them to protect themselves. Bootstraps and all that don't you know!

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The Surge is Working, IV

Necon bullshit once again gets all the print space it desires on the pages of the Washington Post.

The full surge has been in place and operating for just over six months, and already violence has fallen dramatically across the country. The achievement in such a short time of significant legislation that requires all sides to accept risk and compromise with people they had been fighting only a few months ago is remarkable. It would have been unattainable without the change in strategy and addition of American forces that helped bring the violence down. --WAPO

This editorial claptrap from Messrs. Keane, Kagan, and the known liar O'Hanlon is part of the current push to get us to swallow that "The Surge Is Working"©.

The New York Times' Michael Gordon helps out with an attack which is double pronged. He of course pushes "The Surge Is Working"© meme and also takes a whack at those silly cut and run surrender-crats, the democratic presidential candidates in "War, Meet the 2008 Campaign"

The politicians, on the other hand, seemed more intent on addressing public impatience with an open-ended commitment in Iraq, either by promising prompt withdrawal (the Democrats) or by suggesting that victory may be near (the Republicans).

Anthony Cordesman, a military specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies who regularly visits Iraq, put it this way: “You have to grade all the candidates between a D-minus and an F-plus. The Republicans are talking about this as if we have won and as if Iraq is the center of the war on terrorism, rather than Afghanistan and Pakistan and a host of movements in 50 other countries.

“The Democrats talk about this as if the only problem is to withdraw and the difference is over how quickly to do it.”

On the ground with the troops, it is clear that a major military change was in fact made in Iraq last year — not so much the addition of 30,000 troops, but the shift to a counterinsurgency strategy for using them. That strategy made the protection of Iraq’s population a paramount goal in an effort to drive a wedge between the people and the militants and to encourage Iraqis to provide intelligence that the American military forces need to track down an elusive foe.

The emphasis mine. The latter part of their strategy, getting the Iraqi's to provide intelligence to the military is doomed. Why? Because we torture. Remember all those times I quoted U.S. intelligence training on why you don't torture is because you hamper any future intelligence gathering ability. The chickens have come home to roost. They might be getting some intelligence but be sure it's been slowed to a trickle. Who in their right mind would want to be seen talking to the U.S.?

More importantly, the Neo-cons and CENTCOM are trying to say that the strategy shift in Iraq wasn't just increasing the troop count but a change in their overarching strategy and now they are being policemen, and protecting the Iraqi's. Then why the hell did nearly 100 Iraq's die just the other day?

The street battles between members of a messianic cult and Iraqi troops raged for a second day as the death toll from the fighting in two predominantly Shiite southern cities rose from 50 to at least 68.

Iraqi authorities said at least 36 people were reported killed in Basra, Iraq's second largest city, and at least 32 in Nasiriyah, including Iraqi security forces, civilians and gunmen. At least 10 people were reported slain in Nasiriyah Friday...U.S. military spokesman Maj. Brad Leighton said jet fighters flew over the area in a show of force after the Iraqis requested help, but said no airstrikes were carried out and the only U.S. involvement was the air support.

If our whole new strategy is protecting Iraqi's. Why aren't we doing it?

The surge is yet another spin-war from the pentagon and I don't know if anybody is paying attention but the casualties for January have shot right back up to more than 1 day. But don't worry, "The Surge Is Working"©

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The Surge is Working III, via Juan Cole

Andrew Bacevich eviscerates the Iraq War party with this passionate and clear-sighted essay on 'the Surge to Nowhere' in WaPo. He points out that the real motivation behind last year's troop escalation was to avoid popular outrage building in the US electorate to the point where the troops were pulled out. He observes that the argument for the 'success' of the 'surge' is purely a tactical one. When viewed from the vantage point of grand strategy, the Iraq War is as much a failure as it has always been.

If someone came to you six years ago and said that for only $2 trillion, you could have for your colony a burned out country, a failed state, and a semi-permanent incubator of terrorism and hatred against the US, would you have ponied up the money? That's what you've got, and that is what it cost you. Detroit could have used some of that money. New Orleans could have used some of that money. Appalachia has lots of schools that need to be painted.

Read the rest at JuanCole.com

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The Surge is Working II

60 Miles north of Baghdad

a major offensive to drive Al Qaeda in Iraq from Diyala province—was underway, and the troops from Blackfoot Company were in the vanguard, tasked with securing the area for their comrades in the rear...

The insurgents holed up here remain tenacious, unleashing suicide bombers and planting lethal explosives that can blow anything off the road. And they've upped the ante. A severed head turned up last week in a deserted market in Shakarat, a mere 500 yards from the U.S. military's combat outpost.

Al Qaeda apparently got wind of the offensive beforehand; some locals say they were tipped off by Iraqi Army sources. The insurgents set booby traps, then disappeared.

Calm didn't last long. A 50-pound IED rocked the house and sent a 25-ton Army vehicle bouncing into the air. Smoke billowed, and we took cover while the company rushed out to investigate. Inside the vehicle, four soldiers and a freelance reporter were injured. "It blew up right under my feet," the writer, Rick Tomkins, told me. "I was just holding my breath wondering if there would be another blast." The soldiers found no Qaeda operatives. Like phantoms, the culprits had slipped away yet again

In Diyala, A New Offensive (Newsweek)

Oh yeah, the surge is working for sure. They can't even find the bad guys. Flying HMMV's and severed heads, that's certainly evidence that the surge is working.

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The Surge is Working

The cultivation of opium poppies whose product is turned into heroin is spreading rapidly across Iraq as farmers find they can no longer make a living through growing traditional crops.

Afghan with experience in planting poppies have been helping farmers switch to producing opium in fertile parts of Diyala province, once famous for its oranges and pomegranates, north- east of Baghdad.

At a heavily guarded farm near the town of Buhriz, south of the provincial capital Baquba, poppies are grown between the orange trees in order to hide them, according to a local source.

Al-Qa'ida in Iraq is in control of many of the newly established opium farms and has sometimes taken the land of farmers it has killed, said a local source. At Buhriz, American military forces destroyed the opium farm and drove off al-Qa'ida last year but it later returned. "No one can get inside the farm because it is heavily guarded," said the source, adding that the area devoted to opium in Diyala is still smaller than that in southern Iraq around Amara and Majar al-Kabir.

Iraq has not been a major consumer of drugs but heroin from Afghanistan has been transited from Iran and then taken to Basra from where it is exported to the rich markets of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the Gulf. Under Saddam Hussein, state security in Basra was widely believed to control local drug smuggling through the city. -- UK Independent

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