"Simply Wrong"
The Washington Post calls to account those who -- like Hillary Clinton -- were asserting last month that the surge isn't working. Here are some of the cold, hard (for Democrats) facts:
In September, Iraqi civilian deaths were down 52 percent from August and 77 percent from September 2006, according to the Web site icasualties.org. The Iraqi Health Ministry and the Associated Press reported similar results. U.S. soldiers killed in action numbered 43 -- down 43 percent from August and 64 percent from May, which had the highest monthly figure so far this year. The American combat death total was the lowest since July 2006 and was one of the five lowest monthly counts since the insurgency in Iraq took off in April 2004.
What's more:
Sunni tribes in Anbar province that once fueled the insurgency have switched sides and declared war on al-Qaeda. The radical Shiite leader Moqtada al-Sadr ordered a cease-fire last month by his Mahdi Army. Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the top day-to-day commander in Iraq, says al-Qaeda's sanctuaries have been reduced 60 to 70 percent by the surge.
No one disputes that the ultimate solution in Iraq must be political, not military. But military security is certainly a precondition for the politics to work. And those who enjoy denigrating the Iraqis for the failure thus far to progress as far as we'd hoped would do well to look at the lack of consensus on issues like health care, social security and the war itself before casting the first stone.
Can anyone imagine how ugly it would be if this Congress had to grapple with the major issues confronting the Iraqi parliament? Is anyone sure that we would be resolving them more quickly?
In September, Iraqi civilian deaths were down 52 percent from August and 77 percent from September 2006, according to the Web site icasualties.org. The Iraqi Health Ministry and the Associated Press reported similar results. U.S. soldiers killed in action numbered 43 -- down 43 percent from August and 64 percent from May, which had the highest monthly figure so far this year. The American combat death total was the lowest since July 2006 and was one of the five lowest monthly counts since the insurgency in Iraq took off in April 2004.
What's more:
Sunni tribes in Anbar province that once fueled the insurgency have switched sides and declared war on al-Qaeda. The radical Shiite leader Moqtada al-Sadr ordered a cease-fire last month by his Mahdi Army. Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the top day-to-day commander in Iraq, says al-Qaeda's sanctuaries have been reduced 60 to 70 percent by the surge.
No one disputes that the ultimate solution in Iraq must be political, not military. But military security is certainly a precondition for the politics to work. And those who enjoy denigrating the Iraqis for the failure thus far to progress as far as we'd hoped would do well to look at the lack of consensus on issues like health care, social security and the war itself before casting the first stone.
Can anyone imagine how ugly it would be if this Congress had to grapple with the major issues confronting the Iraqi parliament? Is anyone sure that we would be resolving them more quickly?
posted by LadybugUSA at 12:45 PM
2 Comments:
Several left-leaning commentors on this sight repeated ad nauseum the "No Net Improvement" talking point throughout the last couple of months. I asked them then to keep an eye out over the next few months to see if that stance would hold water.
I asked recently on another thread if any of them would like to stand by or ammend those earlier statments. The result:
A deafening silence!
Greg, I believe that there is really only one main reason why they oppose this war on terror and that is because their political party didn't do it, and dosen't get credit for it! Am I right?
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