Turns out the explanation is pretty simple: It hasn’t even fucking begun yet in earnest.
The Reid Doctrine: preemptively declaring defeat before allowing a military strategy to begin—all so that people calling themselves “Atrios” or “TRex” will like you.
Statesmanship, Democrat-style!
(h/t FA)
So, those guys are in the 17 or 19% who think he’s doing a good job? Not that it’s important, but Bush’s approval rating’s about double that.
Yeah, but only Bush’s approval rating matters, because… BUSH LIED!
Or something like that.
I cannot say that this surprises me. It just follows with their “listen to the Generals” and then calling the same Generals hacks and incompetent. Reid and Pelosi should be embarassing to anyone that voted for them. Sadly, they are not.
Dingy Harry and Nancy Botox want to stop the counterinsurgency campaign before it starts because any sort of success will hurt the Democrats in 2008. Plain as day.
Anybody care to take bets on whether or not this will be reported on the mainstream media’s nightly “news” ?
Did he lie, or mis-speak ?
Any word on when the surge will begin in earnest? Are we going to wait for something victorious to happen and then announce the battle is joined? And what are we doing until then?
I recently speculated that Bush may be waiting until September to pardon Libby. That way, if the surge is working, he can use that to deflect attention from the pardon, and if the surge is failing, he can use Libby to deflect attention from Iraq.
I should email the White House and suggest that.
It’s like Wonder Woman’s bracelets, your view of politics.
*waves hand in air like in grade school*
I know! We’re going to listen to partisan sniping from politicians and people who are more interested in having someone with a “D” after their name in power than having people in power who do what they think is right for the country and damn the polls. There are some D’s who have convictions and are true to them, and there are certainly plenty of R’s who are weasels, but the loudest bleating is coming D’s whose only motivation is their own power.
As for when the surge officially begins, I guess Patreus (sp?) would be a good source for that information.
“Petraeus.” And Kilcullen is a good source, too – he’s an Aussie reserve officer and anthropologist who’s seconded to Petraeus’ staff. They have some other good guys, too – but the real question is not whether they can do it, it’s whether they’ll get the time, the support and the press.
Uh…no, no, and no. What did I win?
but the real question is not whether they can do it, it’s whether they’ll get the time, the support and the press.
Whooah! Time out. Didn’t Congress pass the military spending authorization supplemental? If so, I’d say they have the time and the only support they need is the president’s.
Harry and the press are now both irrelevant.
Hot damn!
Credulocity! Gulliblitiness! Catch the fevah!
You’re doin’ a heckuva job, Reidy.
I’m sure you’ll observe common decency and inform them of this new development. It’s unclear if they are aware of this.
Jeff,
I have a draft on topic. You can okay it, borrow from it, whatever.
The short version is that the MSM stories on the new Pentagon report are misleading and not even clever about it.
Where would anyone have received the idea that the surge has already started?
Townhall:
Shhhh… The Surge is Working
Washington Post:The ‘Surge’ Is Succeeding
Isn’t that cute? LF thinks the drive-by media would focus on a successful surge instead of sending up another round of REPUBLICAN CULTURE OF CORRUPTION distraction.
LF, I owe you a lollipop.
Harry Reid’s chalk outline.
So which is it: The surge isn’t working because we haven’t begun in earnest? Or the surge is working?
Maybe we haven’t begun in earnest but it’s working anyway? We’re just that good?
Don’t know much about history, huh, bub?
Why are you so intent on seeing defeat in Iraq, LF? Is it because you’re so PC?
Maybe it’s like the fearsome springtime offensive in Afghanistan. Of the two, from which did the media anticipate a more successful effort?
Lol.
No, I want to see victory. I just don’t want to see it where it’s not.
Was that the springtime offensive AFTER the Dreaded Afghan Winter, or the one the following year?
I preemptively question the timing. I wondering about what they’ve got up their sleeve for the last week in December too.
It just may be that detailed surge plans were finally, successfully kept out of Harry Reid’s staffers’ sticky fingers, so they couldn’t be leaked to al Qaeda in Iraq or the New Yawk Times (which is about the same). A surge must be prepped before execution, the press has very lousy track record for reporting wars, and it has its own agenda (remember Dan Rather?).
Hell, I remember Walter Cronkite and his lies about the TET offensive in 1968. It isn’t much better today.
Hippies suck.
Authoritarian hippies suck even more.
Pelosi and Reid suck even more than that.
No shower will ever clean the filth they have accumulated on themselves.
Any word when the invasion of Europe is going to begin? Are we going to sit around drilling and building up forces forever waiting for the Soviets to do something and then suddenly announce we’ve invaded? And just what the hell does that loudmouth Patton think he’s doing?
Tom, you know Patton could never pass the global test – I mean, his numbers are in the basement in all our Vichy and Berlin polling.
I have no idea what you are even trying to communicate in this post but let’s get one thing straight: This war is on the conservatives, and you have botched it horrifically by anyone’s standards. Surge, re-surge, double secret surge, whatever you want to do, the end result will be the same: complete defiance by the Sunnis in Iraq. I think that conservatives secretly wanted to have the recent funding bill go against them so they could lay blame elsewhere. You have another year of failure to find another way to blame someone else for this, the most ill-conceived and worst American foreign policy decision in out history.
AP wait until the press finds out he tortures his own troops!
First a slap and then, naked twister…
“da horraw”
We already know who’s to blame for losing the Left’s and the media’s war on America.
Oh, that’s not the one you meant?
This war is on the conservatives, and you have botched it horrifically by anyone’s standards.
Except mine.
Anybody else?
And while we’re waiting for the rest to weigh in, how about some proof of the botchiness?
how about some proof of the botchiness?
You must be proof of lowered American standards. How about proof that it isn’t a disaster?
You made a definitive statement; “you have botched it horrifically by anyone’s standards”. I would think that if you truly believe that statement, you would have some proof to support it. Otherwise I will be forced to conclude you are just another moonbat spewing Kos/DU talking points.
Ronaldo, lowered american standards? No, just grown-up we-learned-real-history standards instead of your juvenile, “are-we-there-yet” juvenile standards.
If your “standards” were in effect in WWII, we would have given up in January of 1943.
Oh ronaldo your repetitive blather is horrifically tiresome, same shit everyday since 1968.
Mine too TomB. While we are at it, also by any standard of war in history and history will show just how extraordinary is our our US Armed Forces.
Superior standard I’d say.
If your “standards†were in effect in WWII, we would have given up in January of 1943.
Huh? WWII didn’t last this long for the USA.
Hey kids: feed them at your peril.
Just sayin’.
Clearly the war was botched—by Hollywood standards.
By real-world standards, not so much.
But it’s fun tormenting the trolls!
“Blah blah botched it horrifically by anyone’s standards blah blah”.
I just hate to see what our newest resident troll would think of some of history’s recent successes… 3,000 US casualties in one day on Omaha Beach, 6,000 dead taking 20 square kilometer Iwo Jima….
If they can’t state the standards we fail under or if they can state them and the standards don’t hold up historically, they fail. Ronaldo McDonaldo is the latest failure.
I still like the part where we kill terrorists. I really like that part a lot. I think this is something we would do much less of were a Democrat to be elected president. I bet the terrorists would like that, but for myself I would feel like we were taking a step back.
This troll’s outa here. For a day or so there, I was under the illusion it really was possible to be a liberal and discuss things civilly with conservatives. But I now see that, unless one is a masochistic liberal or just wants to exchange barbs, it’s really not possible.
Let’s see….
December of 1941 to January of 1943…..
Add the square root of mumble mumble mumble…
Carry the seven…mumble mumble mumble…
Pi are square mumble mumble mumble…
That’s 14 months.
I was right. Leftists don’t know history.
It’s especially cute when they haughtily demand that you do their homework for them.
It is. When you get to be liberal instead of all proggy and stuff, come back and give it another try.
I’m so sorry you had that experience, LF, but you do whatever you need to do to start the healing. Take care of yourself.
My vote is for the masochism.
Do you play yankee-my-wankee when you’re reading the thread?
That’d be proof positive.
Just saying, is all.
Uh, LF, who peed in your Wheaties? If it was my comment in the Reid thread, I’d thought the PC line would have made it clear it was a joke.
For those who complain that the liberation of Iraq has lasted longer than WWII, let’s first note that the war to liberate Iraq lasted about three weeks. Everything since has been an attempt to recover from the madness Saddam inflicted on Iraq and rebuild a shattered society, all the while taking flak from invested interests who remain more interested in seeing the US lose than in seeing Iraq win.
And if you still think it’s taken too long, how would you feel about regressing to the tactics and the rules of engagement the allies used in WWII? If George Patton, Bull Halsey, and Bomber Harris (to name just a few) were running the show today, my guess is that the local population would be a lot more complacent, as well as a whole lot smaller.
We are taking far too many potshots from historically ignorant people who don’t appreciate the difficulties in trying to use a sledgehammer like a scalpel.
More than likely you made some unfounded assertions and expected/demanded that we prove they are false. That’s the usual “discussion” that progs bring to the table around here.
However, now that you are withdrawing from the field, I join my voice with happyfeet’s. Godspeed, LF.
Yeah, LF, you have to be very snarky and not care that the people here believe it’s 2003. I mean, “prove Iraq has been botched.” It’s only here where the point needs to be proved and cannot be proved no matter what.
That didn’t take long.
And if it’s so obvious, Timmah! it shouldn’t be a difficult task to lay out a few facts and contrast them historically. Howzabout you read this, and then tell us how it’s a complete disaster and nothing has changed.
Is that guy stupid or deluded or what?
Yep, Godspeed.
Just, don’t turn this into a ‘goodbye’ ala Christine for heaven’s sake…
Alright, timmah. Take a historical standard from warfare, and show how our military is failing. While you are at it, I suppose that you will be able to show us one engagement that we have lost.
Chuck, with the exception of Harris (a war criminal in my mind), I don’t recall the vast murder of civilians under Patton. Where would Patton’s armor attack?
Harris would certainly bomb every Iraqi urban area, much like LeMay would have, but it would largely be to no good, just as area bombing failed against Germany and North Vietnam. Still, it might make certain people feel better
Halsey might have trouble finding Al Queda’s navy….but I get the point he often murdered entire villages. Oh, hold it that was the enemy who did that in China and the resistance in China ended, right?
Indiscriminate ROE’s don’t work and our military knows it. That’s why they don’t do it.
Comparing Iraq to World War 2 is sophistry. There is no delineated political opponent. There are no battle lines. There is no Wehrmacht. You folks only sound like crazies when you bust out the World War 2 takes.
LF
Go if you want, but don’t whine about substance.
After all, you wrote this:
“So which is it: The surge isn’t working because we haven’t begun in earnest? Or the surge is working?
Maybe we haven’t begun in earnest but it’s working anyway? We’re just that good?”
This is disingenuous at worst and rigid thinking at best.
All of the troops marked for the surge are not in place yet. Once those troops get in place, the fully staffed and fully equipped surge begins in earnest.
That isn’t to say that the surge is not building in earnest right now. Troops are being repositioned, combat outposts are being built and fortified. Local leaders are being contacted and liaisons solidified. This preliminary work has shown some notable success in Al-Anbar and has also flushed some bad guys into Diyala.
Results from the surge preliminaries are mixed.
No one I know here is claiming ultimate victory has been achieved.
Speaking for myself, I am objecting to the left calling the surge a loser:
1. Before the timetable given for the build up preliminary to the surge is over.
2. Before the end of September when results are expected to be measurable.
Petraeus gave a timeline and Congress agreed to it. Three months left, and about 1/2 way in the Democrats fold.
Predictable, but still. Why not wait until August to wonder aloud? Why not wait until the evidence is in to declare failure?
I do not see how your parties position is defensible. The totality of the evidence is not in. The surge may indeed fail to achieve the results Petraeus described, but that remains to be seen…. right?
tw: leaders97 (I can wish)
Pablo, Davey said that? Cool, let’s withdraw our forces.
JD, by what measure do you see success? Electricity? Car bombing? Sectarian violence? Minarets at Shia Holy shrines being blown up? The Pentagon reporting that more Americans and Iraqis died recently?
I’m not sure what you call peace, but I’ll defer to Cobra 2 and some exciting anecdotes from my family members who have been to Iraq. OR, I could ask the 2 million Iraqis who have fled?
Comparing Iraq to World War 2 is sophistry.
Depends on the kind of comparison you’re making. If you are noting the rise of Yet Another Horrific Totalitarian Ideology That Is Hell-Bent On Ruling The World and that the intellectual elites can’t seem to recognize it for what it is (or think that appeasement is Good Enough), then the comparison is apt. This is, BTW, the primary type of comparison that the dextrosphere makes between Iraq or the WoT and WWII.
If you’re comparing battle losses, length of engagement, tactics, etc., then yes, it’s a bad comparison.
I’m not a student of military history so I don’t know, but would the Philippine insurgency of the 1940s be a more apt comparison?
How long has the occupation lasted?
But in all seriousness, there were some who advocated “total war” in the attack on Iraq. That is, complete and total destruction of all infrastructure and an annihilation of the army and all militias. We did that in WW2 and it made the “peace” much easier because there were essentially nobody left to fight.
Do you believe that was the proper way to fight Iraq?
Reading your very first post on this thread, it was you doing the poo flinging.
You’re just pissed you got it thrown back in your face.
Davey? Try it in big people talk, Timmah! Save that inane gobbledygook for your little one. And really, don’t spend to long with it there, either.
Renaldo-
I do the same thing when my kid is being a little shit. I tell my wife “hey babe, come in here and deal with YOUR child” He is only mine when he is good, you see. It works for kids but not our nations foriegn policy. Unless, of course, your a complete idiot.
timmah – I realize that you do not really wish to discuss these issues, preferring to make assertions couched as fact. Electricity? Not an attribute Iraq was known for prior to the war, and service is difficult when millions of dollars of work can be blown up by an insurgent with a vest and $100 in explosives. Mosques and minarets? They are not being blown up by us, and it is an AQ tactic to target their own religion to inflame the Sunni. Car bombing? Give me a fucking break here. How about this. Multiple free elections. An economy that continues to grow. A populace increasingly frustrated by terroists. No Saddam, Hussay, or Qusay. In terms of military, this is one of, if not the most efficient engagement, with the fewest numbers of casualties on both sides. But those are just facts, and I know you just find them inconvenient.
General Timmyb and noted historian opines again.
Area bombing didn’t fail against Germany.
Area bombing as an end itself, or as a “message” (North Vietnam) doesn’t work.
ROE has nothing to do with bombing. The US has never exercised an “indiscriminate ROE” which would be more accurately put as “no stated ROE.”
1920 Revolution Brigades are turning on al Qaeda in Diyala, ejecting the terrorists from thier communities. Similiar events took place in Baghdad last week.
The day after the new attack on the Grand Mosque of Samarra, no deathsquad retribution.
Al Qaeda has issued verbal attacks against the Sunnis–calling them traitors–and launched physical attacks against their leaders.
The final U.S. combat brigade of the surge has just hit the ground and is still learning its area of operations. Despite this, some areas of Baghdad have seen a marked improvement in the security situation since the inception of the Baghdad Security Plan.
The security in the Karkh district, which is in the heart of Baghdad and home to Haifa Street, has greatly improved. “During the month of May, there were 35 attacks in Karkh, a drop of 60 percent from January,” said Colonel Bryan Roberts, commander of the 2nd Brigade Combat Team of the 1st Cavalry Division, which is in charge of security in that area. “Even more impressive is the decrease in sectarian murders–four in the month of May, down 94 percent from January’s 53.”
Since none of the “it’s a disaster” brigade can tell us why it is a disaster, let’s look at it another way.
Please tell us what it would take for Iraq, say, in the next 6 months, to NOT look like a disaster.
Impeachment.
/every last fucking one of them!
The two things you should never bet against are the U.S. economy and the U.S. military. The Mediacrats have consistently done both.
They may believe there is short-term political gain from this crap (and there may, in fact, be), but in the long run, they will be devastated by their failure to act like patriots and adults.
I just wish those willing to take exception to the post would at least give me the courtesy of following the link and listening to the discussion.
It is very informative—and it’s not just a couple of bloggers chatting.
But I guess they have a narrative to protect—in Timmy’s case, his repeated (and frankly boring) insistence that we’re all stuck in the past here.
HAVE YOU NOT SEEN THE POLLS? COME ON, BOYS! SURRENDER! HOP ON BOARD FOR THE BIG DEM WIN!
Would any of the “conservatives” here like to talk about their experiences discussing things “civilly” with the Kos Kidz and the Amandas of the world?
Spare the plaintive whine, kid. You disdain us – we disdain you. Ain’t nothing going to change either of our minds about that.
Ronaldo burps: “Huh? WWII didn’t last this long for the USA.”
Uh, Ronaldo, it wasn’t a comment about the length of time, it was a comment about how adults versus juvenile viewpoints view the low point of wars. Go see how things were going for the US after a year of WWII.
Insurgencies take time, and people who have any knowledge of history know this.
Not what?
Monkey-balls…
Please tell us what it would take for Iraq, say, in the next 6 months, to NOT look like a disaster.
That would be the ‘Gaza Strip’, Alex. Now. What did I win.
Hairy Reed sees a gained seat for dems in every American soldier’s death. He is a cock. A cock with an empty scrotum.
I am not fond of Hairy Reed, so put me on the 81% side.
You sound like one all the time.
dimmyb, that is.
No Rusty, if that is indeed the case, then we all win…
”Surge, re-surge, double secret surge, whatever you want to do, the end result will be the same: complete defiance by the Sunnis in Iraq.”
You mispelled “extinction of”.
Uh, oh. Mona’s OUTRAGED by that, Akatsukami. Likely she’s penning an brutally frank, knowing post even as we speak about the vile, diseased, obscene “eliminationists” that hang out here, beating the drums of war.
When the alternative is peace. And who wouldn’t want that?—‘ceptin’ the bloodlusting neocons…
Prediction: the word “Greenwald” will be used at least thrice.
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice Beetl –
Jeff – Double or nothing she mentions his new book, and the various places he has been quoted!
Cripes – I wasted all that time in ILE-CC working on the history sections, the leadership, strategy, operations and tactics, acquisitons, planning – all for naught… I could simply have asked left leaning blog commenters to explain it all to me.
I had to go and waste 22 and a half years in stuff like education, training, and experience in the field. Sigh. To think, true military wisdom is so easy as to be reducable to a few short sentences.
Well, that does it. I’m off to go shred my FM library and burn my TMs now..
For what it’s worth, I do get the perception that there’s some progress. Increasingly, in reports on run-ins with insurgents, I see the phrase “…and Iraqi forces.” I am hoping to soon see “…led by Iraqi forces,” and eventually “…by Iraqi forces.” That’s my little measure of success.
Forget Harry Reid. How about those leftie-libs in the Pentagon putting out all that crap about violence increasing in Iraq and the surge failing? Friends in 8-sided places and all.
Good point.
Here you go, Lovely Rita.
Plus, I have always liked Petraeus. He seems whip-smart, and not a Bushie bot. If he’s not given the free rein he needs, at least he can fly under the moron radar.
Here’s some good news from Iraq (via the Daily Show’s Aasif Mandvi): Blowing up the two golden minarets on the al-Askari mosque at Samarra is actually good news. Since it represents a RE-bombing, that means Al Qaeda is running out of things to blow up.
“Time to celebrate, uh-huh!”
So then, what I’m thinking from reading the comments about the botchiness quotient, the surge doesn’t have to “succeed” by any particular measure so much as prompt a realistic and objective assessment of the status quo. By historical standards we’re not in bad shape. This fall will be a chance to get that idea out in a clear and persuasive way. I hadn’t thought of it like that until today, but it does seem to flow logically from Harry Reid’s preemptive declaration of failure… Were the failure so truly palpable, it would not need his heraldry. Not opportunism there, then, just fear I think.
Faith is the thing with feathers
that perches on your head
oh – it’s a bird.
Nevermind.
Why does this surge even matter anymore? You’re not referring to plastic army soldiers moved around by a croupier’s stick. Keep it focused.
Lydia
that is lame.
The Mahdi Army can’t even defend their own mosque?
Americans don’t go anywhere near that thing and most Iraqis know it’s defense (or lack thereof) is on the Shiites.
You misunderstood! The point isn’t that we’re at fault. Just that Al Qaeda is running out of things to bomb.
(Also, it’s a joke!)
cynn,
The surge didn’t matter to begin with except as a political bomne to throw to those who insisted that “something different” must be done.
The truth is that we cannot lose in Iraq unless we quit.
That those who were screaming for “something different” immediately began yelling, “but not that!” is immaterial.
Radio Guy, I am clinging to this with all four claws, like a pissed off cat thrown against a wall. And it’s a wall.
and let’s not forget the “something different” was what they asked for. for the most part.
(*wipes tears*)
The couple that blogs together…. (*snif*)
BTW: Welcome home, RTO!
Well, looky here:
U.S. Says Iraq Troop Surge Complete:
this would be like the 101st comment. I wonder what will happen when I hit the little button?
that was a little anticlimactic
I think most of the 400 post Hair epic got eaten, though.
Percocet….
Where to buy percocet. Percocet. Percocet addiction. Percocet and lortab together….