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Those numbers are a slap in the face of everybody who is mindlessly spreading the tale of an improving situation in Iraq. 100% more casualties than last year isn’t a promising sign!
Thank you for the head’s up. It’s been that kinda mornning. Link fixed.
The casualty states are what they are. If your Iraq glass is half full, then the drop in U.S. deaths last month is a harbinger of the light at the end of the tunnel. If your Iraq glass is half empty, then the spike in deaths compared to every previous July speaks to just more darkness.
I think the figures would be more relevant if they also showed deaths on a per capita basis. Troop levels have varied by about 50k from the low in late 2003 to the high in late 2005. I think in previous July’s we had somewhere around 120-130k troops in Iraq, so the extra 28k we have there now should be taken into account.
Even on a per capita basis, the body counts are one of the least helpful metrics. It seems pretty obvious to me that the newer strategy that we started engaging in this spring which puts our troops in the Iraqi neighborhoods instead of the Greenzone, and which has more robust rules of engagement, would result in higher casualties.
It’s important to note the number of deaths and to honor the fallen, but I don’t see it as a helpful exercise in measuring progress.
C Stanley,
How can you ignore the level of violence when assessing a strategy (the “surge”) that is supposed to curb it?
I will concede, however, that the more telling and tragic figure is the Iraqi death count. It’s their security our troops are supposed to be establishing.
The numbers are what they are — numbers, which is why Entropy’s suggestion that they also be crunched on a per capital basis is good.
The devil, as always, is in what’s behind the numbers.
A good example: Iraqi national police deaths track much higher than Iraqi army deaths, which would lead an observer to conclude that the army is not pulling its weight. While that may be true to an extent, it masks the reality that the national police are in harm’s way substantilaly more than the Army.
The most difficult numbers are civilian deaths, which in my view fall between the U.N. and Iraq-government supplied numbers in the 35,000-45,000 range and the numbers in the controversial Johns Hopkins study of last fall that put the total at 630,000.
If a tree falls in the forest do you hear it? If an Iraqi farmer and his goat herd are blown up by an IED intended for Americans do you know it?
The idea of any military strategy, Chris, is that violence will decrease AFTER the military mission is accomplished, not during it.
If we were in June 1944 looking at casualty rate in the invasion of Normandy we’d be appalled (29,000 US troops killed) but look at the results that followed.
Hmm, doesn’t look like the situation is improving. Excuse me pls, but when relatively (looking at, say, the last 4 months) less US soldiers are killed while the death rate for Iraqis is going up, isn’t the most probable explanation coming into mind that instead of securing the streets the US forces keep a low profile and postponed patrolling the streets?
How is this data compatible with the tale “the surge is working”???
If a tree falls in the forest do you hear it? If an Iraqi farmer and his goat herd are blown up by an IED intended for Americans do you know it?
No, but even if you had data on events like that you also can’t assume that the IED was intended for Americans. It could equally well have been intended for a rival sect member, or planted by a foreign fighter intent on exploiting sectarian fault lines and/or scoring a propaganda victory.
Not to be irreverently off-topic to the statistical discussion, but I think this is a pragmatic progression of this conversation…….I’m just reading on page 1 of Rupert’s new sensationalist rag that the House Dems are once again resurrecting “hard pull-out date” legislation.
Query, if you were a “statesman”, would you not consider teeing up something that would first seek to acquire some cross-aisle votes and then progressively work the momentum of that for more instead of this already attempted hard-core gauntlet thing, which immediately is seem as a bludgeon rather than an invitation to join?
Davebo,
You might try looking at O’Hanlon’s most recent report (which came out the day after his OpEd and contains the updated figures he was referring to). You’re basing the discrepency on the figures that predated his visit to Iraq.
CO: I guess that Murtha’s temper tantrum had some effect then. I read earlier that he stomped out of the room when he was told that they weren’t going to put the hard date withdrawal plan up for a vote.
If a tree falls in the forest do you hear it? If an Iraqi farmer and his goat herd are blown up by an IED intended for Americans do you know it?
Shaun, are you not refering here to the difference between UN/Iraq Gov figures for citizen deaths and those quoted by the John Hopkins report?
We have no idea, for example, of just how many Iraqis have died who might otherwise have lived had the hospitals not fallen into disrepair and/or Sunni hands in some cases and Shia hands in others.
No, but even if you had data on events like that you also can’t assume that the IED was intended for Americans. It could equally well have been intended for a rival sect member, or planted by a foreign fighter intent on exploiting sectarian fault lines and/or scoring a propaganda victory.
Is there even a point in distinguishing the two when the ultimate goal is security?
When you look at statistics on crime in the U.S. you don’t just look at the number of police attacked and killed.
Statistics like this, without context, point as much, if not more, to what is not known as to what is known.
You can spin the these limited numbers any way you want, but what conclusions can be drawn from them is pure guesswork. They’re like the ‘jobs created ‘stats released by our government without even an accompnying ‘jobs lost’ tabulation, much less an explanation of what kind of jobs were created or in what pay range or comparison to other time periods.
The first unanswered question that springs to my mind is: where did these deaths occur? The focus is so much on Baghdad, we forget the rest of Iraq. Particularly when quoting Iraqi deaths, it would be vital to compare trends in Iraqi death rates in Baghdad to those in surrounding areas and the rest of the country. How the surge is affecting the rest of Iraq is something important to consider.
In that light, I find the following statement by CS beyond amazing.
“It’s important to note the number of deaths and to honor the fallen, but I don’t see it as a helpful exercise in measuring progress.”
We shouldn’t measure progress against its cost?
That’s a new and strartling idea in any context, but particularly so when we are talking about numbers of dead and wounded US troops and Iraqi civilians.
We also keep dancing around the definition of progress while seldom touching the heart of it.
Whatever the military could achieve and at whatever cost was supposed to be FOR something,
The breathing space goal is being provided for a government which is not there, so what are we prosseing toward?
All this talk of reconciliation does not involve Maliki, as far as I can tell. He gives no sign of wanting it. To the contrary, he has given several signs of being more interested in unleashing the Shia militias to seek revenge.
When we read casualty stats and talk about progress, I think we need to be much clearer about what we can’t surmise from the numbers and what the loss of life and limb is actually achieving or not achieving.
My statement was only startling in your misconstruing it, Doma. I clearly stated that the body counts themselves are a measure of cost, not a measure of progress (or lack of progress). Please show me where I said that the cost to benefit ratio should be ignored.
Chris: Your last post is one good reason why wars and crime can’t be compared. In criminal acts, there isn’t a propaganda aspect to consider; criminals indeed would not try to increase the body count in an effort to make the police appear culpable for the murders so that there would be a public outcry to pull the police off of the street.
You added this, which doesn’t follow logically from what I wrote:
“We shouldn’t measure progress against its cost?”
I wrote that the body counts are not a metric by which we could measure progress; you inferred from that that I was saying that we shouldn’t measure the progress against the cost. The body counts ARE a measure of cost, not a measure of progress. I’m in agreement with you that progress must be measured against cost, but in doing so we have to put the numbers in the right columns. The notion that “more troops killed means that something is wrong with the strategy” is one that has never been part of any rational military planning, nor should it be (not saying that this is a notion that you espouse, but some commenters here seem to think along those lines).
CS said:
“criminals indeed would not try to increase the body count in an effort to make the police appear culpable for the murders so that there would be a public outcry to pull the police off of the street.”
Ever hear of intimidation? Criminals regularly intimidate the public in order to prevent them from co-operating with the police. There is a very clear parellell in terrorism.
Chris: good question, and I won’t pretend that I can answer it well. Decreased sectarian violence is certainly one metric which would make sense to look at, and I’m confused at different numbers that are being tossed around today. The AFP report that Gray linked to above says that civilian casualties are up, but the number they cited for June was much lower than the one cited in the Brookings Iraq index. So, according to Brookings, civilian casualties decreased while according to the AFP report they rose (and I can’t find raw data which was used for the AFP report- anyone know a source?)
Aside from death tolls though, there’re are also measures like weapons caches seized (I’ve read that these have increased) as well as reconstruction projects which are proceeding without sabotage. I don’t know any good sources for data on the latter, and even if I did I’d say that one month after the major offensive of the surge started is too soon to draw conclusions. I imagine that’s why Petraeus agreed to give a report in September, not July.
The notion that “more troops killed means that something is wrong with the strategy†is one that has never been part of any rational military planning.
I suppose that might be true of a military with an unlimited pool of troops and money to draw from.
Doma (comment #26),
Yes, that’s a parallel that does hold- but the analogy I referred to was something different, which is true in war but not criminal activity. The closest to that kind of propaganda in the criminal vs. police sphere would be allegations of police brutality, which although sometimes true are also sometimes propagated for the purpose of having public outcry against a strong police force.
Chris,
I’ll stick by my earlier statement that body counts can’t be part of rational military planning. The consideration of whether or not the nation has the troops and funds needed (and the public support to allocate them) is a political one, not a military one.
CS,
Thanks for being honest about that. My worry is since there is no reliable metric, war supporters can continue to claim there is progress without ever having to prove it. Like the boys at Brookings did a few days ago.
Don’t get me wrong though, I could care less if there is or isn’t progress in Iraq because we should leave or stay at the behest of the Iraqi people.
CS said:
“more troops killed means that something is wrong with the strategy†is one that has never been part of any rational military planning, nor should it be”
Au contraire, the estimated costs are and should be part of every strategy planning. On the other end, defeat/victory are declared when one side decides the costs are too high.
Re: “Youadded this, which doesn’t follow logically from what I wrote:
“We shouldn’t measure progress against its cost?
——
I think my comment is a most logical reaction to your ‘not helpful’ characterization. How does ‘not helpful’ differ from ‘never mind the nasty bits of information’?
The difference is that I didn’t say categorically “not helpful”, I said:
“It’s important to note the number of deaths and to honor the fallen, but I don’t see it as a helpful exercise in measuring progress.”
Again, the troop casualties are a measure of COST, not a measure of PROGRESS. I’m not sure why that point isn’t clear. My ‘not helpful’ comment was about whether or not the troop body count is helpful in determining whether or not the surge is working. It’s important to count the cost, then look at the progress, and determine if we are willing and able to sustain the cost as measured up against progress which may or may not be made. But some are acting as though a reduction in the US troop deaths itself would be progress, which it is not. The goal of a military mission isn’t to save US troop lives. If that was our goal, we’d always keep the troops at home and then we’d have 100% success.
The goal of a military mission isn’t to save US troop lives.
Right, but the stated goal is security, and you’ve already discounted the two major metrics of security. Sure, seized weapons caches might be important, but are they as important as overall levels of violence?
I know you have your reasons for dismissing these numbers, but I don’t think it makes sense to do so in terms of measuring the “surge” if the goal is indeed security.
What two metrics did I dismiss? I’m not saying civilian casualties (esp sectarian violence) doesn’t count, I’m just saying that that two sets of numbers that I’ve seen conflict with each other so I don’t know which to believe.
Another thing that’s hard to sort out in this type of conflict is whether an “Iraqi death” means that an insurgent, a militia guy, or an innocent civilian has been killed. If the people in the first two categories are being killed, then that would be a positive development toward a more peaceful, secure environment but if the majority of “Iraqis killed” are just innocents who are caught in the crossfire then that’s an absence of progress (and increasing numbers of innocents would mean increasing destabilization). Over time, if the total number of deaths decreases then I’d say we could presume there has been killing and/or intimidation of enough of the insurgents/militia fighters to decrease the overall violence. My point is that killing the bad guys is part of the initial process of gaining security, and since all of those deaths get lumped together with the innocent bystanders it is certainly hard to measure the results. Trends help a bit more than snapshots in that regard.
Speaking of civilian deaths, is the U.S. even trying to figure those out these days? I know they stopped a while back because the numbers were unflattering.
In a war bodycounts and progress should go hand in hand. In the above example where Normandy spiked the number of casualties there was a serious step forward in the progress of the war as a result. We landed in Europe and began the push to Berlin.
However in this war, there is merely a grinding loss of life(increasing steadily) with nothing of progress to be seen. I understand the surge is still ongoing so its too early to tell one way or the other, but not much really seems to have changed. We can go to other metrics like availability of electricity, water, and areas outside the green zone where Iraqi gov’t officials can walk openly but I don’t think the picture gets any prettier.
As I said in the beginning, the meager data provided point more to what we don’t know than what we do know.
The bigger question looms over everything for me, however: what are we progressing toward? What did the 78 US troops die for? Are we now trying to secure Baghdad for its own sake, just because it’s Baghdad? Maliki’s governemtnt is using the breathing space to breathe elsewhere. I understand the goals, but we can’t keep on talking about goals without looking up to ask what we are, in fact, accomplishing in the meantime.
I keep harping on this, because I fear we may be accomplishing exactly the opposite of the stated goals of the surge. We may be enabling Maliki to avoid reconciliation indefinitly. Add Maliki’s indefinitely to oir committing our troops indefinitely, and this all could turn into an indefinity hell.
CS-
Your argument about cost=casualties and progress is so convoluted, it;s not worthwhile to disect it.
Just one point:
Since the stated goal was not purely military, then progress can not be graded in purely military terms. The difinition of progress keeps shifting from comment to coment, even though all costs have to be weighed against gains toward the stated goals.
This has fevolved into a word game, and that is truly not helpful.
CS-
Okay. Let’s say I’m just confused. So, help me out, please.
What exactly do you mean when you say ‘progress’?
a) increased secutiry in Baghdad only?
b) decreased violence in Iraq as a whole?
c) progress in Iraqi government?
d) other (please specify)
To aboid misuderstanding, I’d really need to know what your definitions are.
Perhaps we just define ‘progress’ diffenrently?
Doma:
a)Not Baghdad only, but for a mission which takes place in Baghdad the goal of that particular mission would be to increase security in Baghdad, yes.
b)Decreased violence in Iraq as a whole is a long term goal of the entire war. In the short term, violence would be expected to increase as war involves killing of ‘bad guys’.
c) Progress in Iraqi govt is also a goal. Bush outlined the progress made to date since the beginning of the surge, which was 41% of the benchmarks laid out at the beginning of it. Not good enough yet, but not a complete failure to make progress. Some points are obviously quite intractable so far since the different sects are so polarized and understandably distrustful of one another.
d) Other: Reconstruction, reconstruction, reconstruction. The Iraqi people have to buy into the idea of unity, and that can’t happen as long as they don’t have a functioning infrastructure. If progress isn’t made toward normal daily living (for which security and reconstruction go hand in hand), then the individual Iraqis will have nothing to lose and everything to gain by picking up arms against members of other sects whom they see as their enemies. Hard core sectarians and al Qaeda have done quite well in exploiting those fault lines and that’s what we are trying to reverse.
For those reasons, I think that increased security and progress on reconstruction are going to have to precede progress in the govt- so I think that focusing on the local situations is appropriate (it’s just too bad we didn’t effectively do this 3 years ago). That doesn’t mean we don’t care about the lack of progress in the central government, it just means that to me it seems intuitive that one has to be a precursor of the other. Right now, there’s still distrust of Americans so that Maliki can’t openly appear too close to us; if the security situation continues to improve, then the people will begin to see how Maliki’s govt is backing the winner if he continues to work with the US and gradually transition to Iraqi forces providing security. The Sunnis, of course, have the most to distrust in Maliki, so although many people are criticizing the US move toward the Sunni side, I think it makes the most sense of all possible strategic options right now. In addition, of course, there’s a broader view of our policies to contain Iran. Maliki is a Shiite but he’s more of an Iraqi nationalist than other Shiites are, including those like al Sad’r who would turn much closer to Iran.
I’m getting off on tangents here but hope that I’ve addressed your question about my definition of progress. Do you differ with my idea about the metrics of it at all? I really don’t understand the nature of your confusion- the main point I’ve tried to make in this thread is that the consideration of our troop casualty rate is a measure of the cost of the war, not a measure of its progress. I think that there’s a tendency for some people to feel that if more soldiers are dying then that means the war must be going badly. Don’t get me wrong, the death of a single troop is significant and tragic- but you simply can’t look at the goal of war as the protection of our troops (in fact part of the flaws of past strategy included our tendency to insulate our soldiers in the Green Zone.) We want to minimize casualties, but when you measure losses it is a measure of the cost which is then weighed against whatever progress has been made (which Sam stated above- I totally agree).
Let me try to construct a hypothetical to see if this clarifies my point: if 2000 troops and 5000 Iraqis were to die next month in a series of operations which truly cleared and held all of Baghdad and Anbar, and then the results then led to stability, followed by progress in reconciliation of the govt (the Sunni bloc rejoining the govt and the various Shia parties offering them a deal on oil revenue, de-Baathification, etc which was acceptable to them- and a true dismantling of the militias followed).
[Obviously this is fictitious and is not going to happen but I'm exaggerating everything for the sake of illustration]
Would we then look at stats for that month and say that things were going badly because of this upsurge in violence and casualties, or would we see the high cost but also see the progress?
I’m not sure if you think that I’m saying that the cost that we have born to date is worthwhile- I don’t make that claim at all, because it’s too difficult to get accurate information on the progress part. All I’m saying is that the focus on body counts isn’t an accurate way to determine how well things are going, because violence might be happening with or without progress and I don’t think we know which it is right now.
Uh, Shaun, I sincerely hope that those beautiful landscapes and cute ladies didn’t really die in Iraq. Pls check the link you posted!!
Hmm, Shaun seems to be on a weird Deadhead trip right now, so I guess I better provide the right link by myself:
http://kikoshouse.blogspot.com/2007/08/month-52-of-war-by-numbers.html
Those numbers are a slap in the face of everybody who is mindlessly spreading the tale of an improving situation in Iraq. 100% more casualties than last year isn’t a promising sign!
Gray:
Thank you for the head’s up. It’s been that kinda mornning. Link fixed.
The casualty states are what they are. If your Iraq glass is half full, then the drop in U.S. deaths last month is a harbinger of the light at the end of the tunnel. If your Iraq glass is half empty, then the spike in deaths compared to every previous July speaks to just more darkness.
Shaun,
I think the figures would be more relevant if they also showed deaths on a per capita basis. Troop levels have varied by about 50k from the low in late 2003 to the high in late 2005. I think in previous July’s we had somewhere around 120-130k troops in Iraq, so the extra 28k we have there now should be taken into account.
And of course, how one chooses to group their marking periods is also relevant.
One could also choose to group just the more recent months and create this factual headline…….”U.S. toll in Iraq the lowest in 8 months.”
Entropy:
Good point. Will try to do next month.
and we know there will be a next month
Even on a per capita basis, the body counts are one of the least helpful metrics. It seems pretty obvious to me that the newer strategy that we started engaging in this spring which puts our troops in the Iraqi neighborhoods instead of the Greenzone, and which has more robust rules of engagement, would result in higher casualties.
It’s important to note the number of deaths and to honor the fallen, but I don’t see it as a helpful exercise in measuring progress.
C Stanley,
How can you ignore the level of violence when assessing a strategy (the “surge”) that is supposed to curb it?
I will concede, however, that the more telling and tragic figure is the Iraqi death count. It’s their security our troops are supposed to be establishing.
The numbers are what they are — numbers, which is why Entropy’s suggestion that they also be crunched on a per capital basis is good.
The devil, as always, is in what’s behind the numbers.
A good example: Iraqi national police deaths track much higher than Iraqi army deaths, which would lead an observer to conclude that the army is not pulling its weight. While that may be true to an extent, it masks the reality that the national police are in harm’s way substantilaly more than the Army.
The most difficult numbers are civilian deaths, which in my view fall between the U.N. and Iraq-government supplied numbers in the 35,000-45,000 range and the numbers in the controversial Johns Hopkins study of last fall that put the total at 630,000.
If a tree falls in the forest do you hear it? If an Iraqi farmer and his goat herd are blown up by an IED intended for Americans do you know it?
The idea of any military strategy, Chris, is that violence will decrease AFTER the military mission is accomplished, not during it.
If we were in June 1944 looking at casualty rate in the invasion of Normandy we’d be appalled (29,000 US troops killed) but look at the results that followed.
Well, here’s that other bodycount:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070801/wl_mideast_afp/iraq_070801091932;_ylt=AkLgZW57xKXd.K5U_aFokf0UewgF
Hmm, doesn’t look like the situation is improving. Excuse me pls, but when relatively (looking at, say, the last 4 months) less US soldiers are killed while the death rate for Iraqis is going up, isn’t the most probable explanation coming into mind that instead of securing the streets the US forces keep a low profile and postponed patrolling the streets?
How is this data compatible with the tale “the surge is working”???
No, but even if you had data on events like that you also can’t assume that the IED was intended for Americans. It could equally well have been intended for a rival sect member, or planted by a foreign fighter intent on exploiting sectarian fault lines and/or scoring a propaganda victory.
C Stanley:
Good point.
Not to be irreverently off-topic to the statistical discussion, but I think this is a pragmatic progression of this conversation…….I’m just reading on page 1 of Rupert’s new sensationalist rag that the House Dems are once again resurrecting “hard pull-out date” legislation.
Query, if you were a “statesman”, would you not consider teeing up something that would first seek to acquire some cross-aisle votes and then progressively work the momentum of that for more instead of this already attempted hard-core gauntlet thing, which immediately is seem as a bludgeon rather than an invitation to join?
But wait, Pollack and O’Hanlon (who doesn’t read his own work) were just explaining how Iraqi deaths were down by 1/3rd. And they are Democrats!
Hillary, Barack, John et all, will you promise the American voter that there will be no place in your administration for either of the charlatans?
Because that’s a deal breaker for me.
Davebo,
You might try looking at O’Hanlon’s most recent report (which came out the day after his OpEd and contains the updated figures he was referring to). You’re basing the discrepency on the figures that predated his visit to Iraq.
CO: I guess that Murtha’s temper tantrum had some effect then. I read earlier that he stomped out of the room when he was told that they weren’t going to put the hard date withdrawal plan up for a vote.
Shaun, are you not refering here to the difference between UN/Iraq Gov figures for citizen deaths and those quoted by the John Hopkins report?
We have no idea, for example, of just how many Iraqis have died who might otherwise have lived had the hospitals not fallen into disrepair and/or Sunni hands in some cases and Shia hands in others.
Is there even a point in distinguishing the two when the ultimate goal is security?
When you look at statistics on crime in the U.S. you don’t just look at the number of police attacked and killed.
Statistics like this, without context, point as much, if not more, to what is not known as to what is known.
You can spin the these limited numbers any way you want, but what conclusions can be drawn from them is pure guesswork. They’re like the ‘jobs created ‘stats released by our government without even an accompnying ‘jobs lost’ tabulation, much less an explanation of what kind of jobs were created or in what pay range or comparison to other time periods.
The first unanswered question that springs to my mind is: where did these deaths occur? The focus is so much on Baghdad, we forget the rest of Iraq. Particularly when quoting Iraqi deaths, it would be vital to compare trends in Iraqi death rates in Baghdad to those in surrounding areas and the rest of the country. How the surge is affecting the rest of Iraq is something important to consider.
In that light, I find the following statement by CS beyond amazing.
“It’s important to note the number of deaths and to honor the fallen, but I don’t see it as a helpful exercise in measuring progress.”
We shouldn’t measure progress against its cost?
That’s a new and strartling idea in any context, but particularly so when we are talking about numbers of dead and wounded US troops and Iraqi civilians.
We also keep dancing around the definition of progress while seldom touching the heart of it.
Whatever the military could achieve and at whatever cost was supposed to be FOR something,
The breathing space goal is being provided for a government which is not there, so what are we prosseing toward?
All this talk of reconciliation does not involve Maliki, as far as I can tell. He gives no sign of wanting it. To the contrary, he has given several signs of being more interested in unleashing the Shia militias to seek revenge.
When we read casualty stats and talk about progress, I think we need to be much clearer about what we can’t surmise from the numbers and what the loss of life and limb is actually achieving or not achieving.
My statement was only startling in your misconstruing it, Doma. I clearly stated that the body counts themselves are a measure of cost, not a measure of progress (or lack of progress). Please show me where I said that the cost to benefit ratio should be ignored.
Chris: Your last post is one good reason why wars and crime can’t be compared. In criminal acts, there isn’t a propaganda aspect to consider; criminals indeed would not try to increase the body count in an effort to make the police appear culpable for the murders so that there would be a public outcry to pull the police off of the street.
CS-
I copied your last paragraph in full (copy and paste).
I added nothing.
I subtracted nothing.
CS,
Then how would you measure the progress of the “surge” to stabilize the security situation?
You added this, which doesn’t follow logically from what I wrote:
“We shouldn’t measure progress against its cost?”
I wrote that the body counts are not a metric by which we could measure progress; you inferred from that that I was saying that we shouldn’t measure the progress against the cost. The body counts ARE a measure of cost, not a measure of progress. I’m in agreement with you that progress must be measured against cost, but in doing so we have to put the numbers in the right columns. The notion that “more troops killed means that something is wrong with the strategy” is one that has never been part of any rational military planning, nor should it be (not saying that this is a notion that you espouse, but some commenters here seem to think along those lines).
CS said:
“criminals indeed would not try to increase the body count in an effort to make the police appear culpable for the murders so that there would be a public outcry to pull the police off of the street.”
Ever hear of intimidation? Criminals regularly intimidate the public in order to prevent them from co-operating with the police. There is a very clear parellell in terrorism.
Chris: good question, and I won’t pretend that I can answer it well. Decreased sectarian violence is certainly one metric which would make sense to look at, and I’m confused at different numbers that are being tossed around today. The AFP report that Gray linked to above says that civilian casualties are up, but the number they cited for June was much lower than the one cited in the Brookings Iraq index. So, according to Brookings, civilian casualties decreased while according to the AFP report they rose (and I can’t find raw data which was used for the AFP report- anyone know a source?)
Aside from death tolls though, there’re are also measures like weapons caches seized (I’ve read that these have increased) as well as reconstruction projects which are proceeding without sabotage. I don’t know any good sources for data on the latter, and even if I did I’d say that one month after the major offensive of the surge started is too soon to draw conclusions. I imagine that’s why Petraeus agreed to give a report in September, not July.
I suppose that might be true of a military with an unlimited pool of troops and money to draw from.
Doma (comment #26),
Yes, that’s a parallel that does hold- but the analogy I referred to was something different, which is true in war but not criminal activity. The closest to that kind of propaganda in the criminal vs. police sphere would be allegations of police brutality, which although sometimes true are also sometimes propagated for the purpose of having public outcry against a strong police force.
Chris,
I’ll stick by my earlier statement that body counts can’t be part of rational military planning. The consideration of whether or not the nation has the troops and funds needed (and the public support to allocate them) is a political one, not a military one.
CS,
Thanks for being honest about that. My worry is since there is no reliable metric, war supporters can continue to claim there is progress without ever having to prove it. Like the boys at Brookings did a few days ago.
Don’t get me wrong though, I could care less if there is or isn’t progress in Iraq because we should leave or stay at the behest of the Iraqi people.
CS said:
“more troops killed means that something is wrong with the strategy†is one that has never been part of any rational military planning, nor should it be”
Au contraire, the estimated costs are and should be part of every strategy planning. On the other end, defeat/victory are declared when one side decides the costs are too high.
Re: “Youadded this, which doesn’t follow logically from what I wrote:
“We shouldn’t measure progress against its cost?
——
I think my comment is a most logical reaction to your ‘not helpful’ characterization. How does ‘not helpful’ differ from ‘never mind the nasty bits of information’?
The difference is that I didn’t say categorically “not helpful”, I said:
“It’s important to note the number of deaths and to honor the fallen, but I don’t see it as a helpful exercise in measuring progress.”
Again, the troop casualties are a measure of COST, not a measure of PROGRESS. I’m not sure why that point isn’t clear. My ‘not helpful’ comment was about whether or not the troop body count is helpful in determining whether or not the surge is working. It’s important to count the cost, then look at the progress, and determine if we are willing and able to sustain the cost as measured up against progress which may or may not be made. But some are acting as though a reduction in the US troop deaths itself would be progress, which it is not. The goal of a military mission isn’t to save US troop lives. If that was our goal, we’d always keep the troops at home and then we’d have 100% success.
Right, but the stated goal is security, and you’ve already discounted the two major metrics of security. Sure, seized weapons caches might be important, but are they as important as overall levels of violence?
I know you have your reasons for dismissing these numbers, but I don’t think it makes sense to do so in terms of measuring the “surge” if the goal is indeed security.
What two metrics did I dismiss? I’m not saying civilian casualties (esp sectarian violence) doesn’t count, I’m just saying that that two sets of numbers that I’ve seen conflict with each other so I don’t know which to believe.
Another thing that’s hard to sort out in this type of conflict is whether an “Iraqi death” means that an insurgent, a militia guy, or an innocent civilian has been killed. If the people in the first two categories are being killed, then that would be a positive development toward a more peaceful, secure environment but if the majority of “Iraqis killed” are just innocents who are caught in the crossfire then that’s an absence of progress (and increasing numbers of innocents would mean increasing destabilization). Over time, if the total number of deaths decreases then I’d say we could presume there has been killing and/or intimidation of enough of the insurgents/militia fighters to decrease the overall violence. My point is that killing the bad guys is part of the initial process of gaining security, and since all of those deaths get lumped together with the innocent bystanders it is certainly hard to measure the results. Trends help a bit more than snapshots in that regard.
Speaking of civilian deaths, is the U.S. even trying to figure those out these days? I know they stopped a while back because the numbers were unflattering.
In a war bodycounts and progress should go hand in hand. In the above example where Normandy spiked the number of casualties there was a serious step forward in the progress of the war as a result. We landed in Europe and began the push to Berlin.
However in this war, there is merely a grinding loss of life(increasing steadily) with nothing of progress to be seen. I understand the surge is still ongoing so its too early to tell one way or the other, but not much really seems to have changed. We can go to other metrics like availability of electricity, water, and areas outside the green zone where Iraqi gov’t officials can walk openly but I don’t think the picture gets any prettier.
As I said in the beginning, the meager data provided point more to what we don’t know than what we do know.
The bigger question looms over everything for me, however: what are we progressing toward? What did the 78 US troops die for? Are we now trying to secure Baghdad for its own sake, just because it’s Baghdad? Maliki’s governemtnt is using the breathing space to breathe elsewhere. I understand the goals, but we can’t keep on talking about goals without looking up to ask what we are, in fact, accomplishing in the meantime.
I keep harping on this, because I fear we may be accomplishing exactly the opposite of the stated goals of the surge. We may be enabling Maliki to avoid reconciliation indefinitly. Add Maliki’s indefinitely to oir committing our troops indefinitely, and this all could turn into an indefinity hell.
CS-
Your argument about cost=casualties and progress is so convoluted, it;s not worthwhile to disect it.
Just one point:
Since the stated goal was not purely military, then progress can not be graded in purely military terms. The difinition of progress keeps shifting from comment to coment, even though all costs have to be weighed against gains toward the stated goals.
This has fevolved into a word game, and that is truly not helpful.
Uh, OK. Whatever you say, doma. I suspect that most readers understood my point perfectly well, even when it was turned inside out.
CS-
Okay. Let’s say I’m just confused. So, help me out, please.
What exactly do you mean when you say ‘progress’?
a) increased secutiry in Baghdad only?
b) decreased violence in Iraq as a whole?
c) progress in Iraqi government?
d) other (please specify)
To aboid misuderstanding, I’d really need to know what your definitions are.
Perhaps we just define ‘progress’ diffenrently?
Doma:
a)Not Baghdad only, but for a mission which takes place in Baghdad the goal of that particular mission would be to increase security in Baghdad, yes.
b)Decreased violence in Iraq as a whole is a long term goal of the entire war. In the short term, violence would be expected to increase as war involves killing of ‘bad guys’.
c) Progress in Iraqi govt is also a goal. Bush outlined the progress made to date since the beginning of the surge, which was 41% of the benchmarks laid out at the beginning of it. Not good enough yet, but not a complete failure to make progress. Some points are obviously quite intractable so far since the different sects are so polarized and understandably distrustful of one another.
d) Other: Reconstruction, reconstruction, reconstruction. The Iraqi people have to buy into the idea of unity, and that can’t happen as long as they don’t have a functioning infrastructure. If progress isn’t made toward normal daily living (for which security and reconstruction go hand in hand), then the individual Iraqis will have nothing to lose and everything to gain by picking up arms against members of other sects whom they see as their enemies. Hard core sectarians and al Qaeda have done quite well in exploiting those fault lines and that’s what we are trying to reverse.
For those reasons, I think that increased security and progress on reconstruction are going to have to precede progress in the govt- so I think that focusing on the local situations is appropriate (it’s just too bad we didn’t effectively do this 3 years ago). That doesn’t mean we don’t care about the lack of progress in the central government, it just means that to me it seems intuitive that one has to be a precursor of the other. Right now, there’s still distrust of Americans so that Maliki can’t openly appear too close to us; if the security situation continues to improve, then the people will begin to see how Maliki’s govt is backing the winner if he continues to work with the US and gradually transition to Iraqi forces providing security. The Sunnis, of course, have the most to distrust in Maliki, so although many people are criticizing the US move toward the Sunni side, I think it makes the most sense of all possible strategic options right now. In addition, of course, there’s a broader view of our policies to contain Iran. Maliki is a Shiite but he’s more of an Iraqi nationalist than other Shiites are, including those like al Sad’r who would turn much closer to Iran.
I’m getting off on tangents here but hope that I’ve addressed your question about my definition of progress. Do you differ with my idea about the metrics of it at all? I really don’t understand the nature of your confusion- the main point I’ve tried to make in this thread is that the consideration of our troop casualty rate is a measure of the cost of the war, not a measure of its progress. I think that there’s a tendency for some people to feel that if more soldiers are dying then that means the war must be going badly. Don’t get me wrong, the death of a single troop is significant and tragic- but you simply can’t look at the goal of war as the protection of our troops (in fact part of the flaws of past strategy included our tendency to insulate our soldiers in the Green Zone.) We want to minimize casualties, but when you measure losses it is a measure of the cost which is then weighed against whatever progress has been made (which Sam stated above- I totally agree).
Let me try to construct a hypothetical to see if this clarifies my point: if 2000 troops and 5000 Iraqis were to die next month in a series of operations which truly cleared and held all of Baghdad and Anbar, and then the results then led to stability, followed by progress in reconciliation of the govt (the Sunni bloc rejoining the govt and the various Shia parties offering them a deal on oil revenue, de-Baathification, etc which was acceptable to them- and a true dismantling of the militias followed).
[Obviously this is fictitious and is not going to happen but I'm exaggerating everything for the sake of illustration]
Would we then look at stats for that month and say that things were going badly because of this upsurge in violence and casualties, or would we see the high cost but also see the progress?
I’m not sure if you think that I’m saying that the cost that we have born to date is worthwhile- I don’t make that claim at all, because it’s too difficult to get accurate information on the progress part. All I’m saying is that the focus on body counts isn’t an accurate way to determine how well things are going, because violence might be happening with or without progress and I don’t think we know which it is right now.