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.

To aboid misuderstanding, I’d really need to know what your definitions are.
Perhaps we just define ‘progress’ diffenrently?

This has fevolved into a word game, and that is truly not helpful.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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’?

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.

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.

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.

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.

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).