The Secret History of the Gulf War

Greetings all...Wow. I don't really have a lot to add to this, other than to encourage all to check it out immediately. Just a staggeringly comprehensive history, with much info rarely mentioned elsewhere (and aren't we all suckers for that?). Courtesy of those wonderful subversives at The Memory Hole.


The Gulf War: Secret History by William Arkin


P.S.: I would like to welcome the Armchair Admiral from Information Dissemination to the blogroll. This is an excellent, informative site dedicated to the activities of the US Navy, and, for hard information and analysis, I encourage all to check it out.


P.P.S: Check out Man in the Street's new feature, up near the top left of the page, called Where are the Carriers? This page keeps a continually-updated list of all US carrier deployments, for those who like to play RISK (or read tea leaves). Enjoy!

On Taking It to the Streets

     Man, have I been having fun with this report from the Navy.

     Okay, "fun" is probably not the right word...not when a careful reading of how diplomacy should be conducted (if one wishes to avoid war) leads to the strong implication that the US wants war with Iran (and is probably going to get it), as I explore here. No, fun is not the right word...it's just so strange to come across something that seems so intellectually honest. It's comforting to know that somewhere, someone is crunching the data who isn't "fixing the facts around the policy". Sad, too-that the simple act of an analyst trying to do his job should be so noteworthy.

 

     Anyway...the report I am referencing comes from the US Navy's Center for Contemporary Conflict, and the primary focus of it is to consider all the factors that led to the end of the Cold War (as opposed to the knee-jerk Reagan-worship that characterizes so much of US history of the era). The section I will be focusing on here is about the role of peace and human-rights campaigns, and their effectiveness.

     As an activist, it can be very difficult to maintain one's sense of hope. Activists in this nation for the last forty years have been blamed for every variety of pathology that has afflicted the American body politic-from the widely-accepted talking point that says American protesters, fueled by the media, undermined US troops in Vietnam and "lost" the Vietnam War. Protesters are blamed (or credited) for freezing the US nuclear power industry. Protest movements against environmental destruction are blamed for the lack of newly-constructed oil refineries in the US, and thus blamed for high gas prices today. Protesters against apartheid in South Africa were routinely mocked and ridiculed, even as the US government was calling Nelson Mandela a terrorist. And the protests against the atrocities carried out during the covert war in Central America, by the pro-government death squads in El Salvador, and by the anti-Sandinista Contra terrorist army in Nicaragua-those were like nothing I had seen in this country since Vietnam, and they were treated the same way: with mockery and derision in the State Media, with surveillance and infiltration by the FBI, and with tear gas and rubber bullets in the streets.

So why protest? Why put oneself through it?...

Because it works. From the Navy:

In response to the development of new nuclear weapon systems... and statements by Reagan...suggesting the United States could... win a nuclear war, massive protest movements arose in both Western Europe and the United States. These movements sought an end to... the nuclear arms race. Reflecting this focus, in the United States the campaign emphasized the call for a bilateral "freeze" in nuclear weapons development. It may sound strange to give some credit for ending the Cold War to both Reagan and his most vociferous opponents, but there is good reason to do so. The peace movements of the 1980's did not succeed in getting their explicit policy demands adopted...However, they did succeed in moderating Western policy. In response to the peace movement's success in appealing to public opinion..Reagan...ceased all rhetoric suggesting the idea of a winnable nuclear war; instead, President Reagan began speaking regularly about his own concerns regarding the dangers of nuclear weapons. In addition, the United States entered new nuclear arms talks earlier than the Reagan administration had originally intended, and, after talks broke down in fall 1983, the administration worked to ensure talks would resume again as soon as possible. 

You mean...protest movements DID help end the Cold War?

Another, even more important strand of grassroots activity was centered in Eastern Europe... The efforts of groups like Solidarity in Poland and Charter 77 in Czechoslovakia paved the way for the revolutions of 1989 that swept away the existing Communist rulers across Eastern Europe. The most decisive events in ending the Cold War...took place on the ground in Eastern Europe. The citizens of these countries who organized and participated in these events have the most obvious, direct links to the crumbling of the Soviet bloc, so their contribution to the end of the Cold War should not be underestimated...Gorbachev's response to these events was also critically important. In the past, most notably in Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968, the Soviet Union had responded to stirrings of independence in its satellites with military intervention. In 1989, Gorbachev made it clear that the Soviet Union would not use its military to assist the Communist governments in these countries in suppressing the opposition movements. This decision had nothing to do, at least directly, with U.S. strength...  In fact, many of the ideas and proposals embraced by Gorbachev had their origins in liberal-leaning Western NGOs and research institutes and were transmitted to the Soviet leader through transnational channels rather than through government-to-government communication...

     So...protests DO work. Activism works. All that marching, protesting, demanding accountability...WORKS. Not only does it work to end unjust policies, it works to encourage just policy. So to all of you working to end the occupation of Iraq and the tide of "friendly fascism" here at home, be of good cheer. It will work. Know that you are doing the right thing, and in a way that will actually accomplish something good.

  

Diplomacy, and the Coming War with Iran

(Updated)

And now, events begin to accelerate...

I've been reading some interesting analysis from the US Navy, in particular this. While the document itself is a look at the Reagan-era Cold War, the part I'm excerpting is a general look at diplomatic theory, that, to me, seems particulary relelvant to our ongoing war of nerves with Iran:

This research suggests that a purely hard-line strategy aimed at forcing the other state out of existence is unlikely to be successful...Coercive diplomacy is a strategy that employs threats, especially military threats, to pressure a target state to change its behavior. Research...finds that the strategy fails much more often than it succeeds...Coercion is especially unlikely to succeed when the other side would threaten its survival by giving in to the demands placed on it...

In contrast to coercive diplomacy, which seeks to stop or change a course of action already underway, deterrence seeks to prevent an action from being initiated by threatening to impose costs on the target state if it takes that action...the most powerful threat the deterrer can issue is the threat to eliminate the ruling regime in the other state.

So...coercive diplomacy is threatening them to change their behavior, and deterrence is threatening them if they change their behavior.

For this deterrent... to work, the target state must have assurance that, as long as it does not take the action being deterred, it will not suffer the threatened punishment...If the deterrer announces plans to try to change the regime in the other state whether or not it acts aggressively, then the other side has no incentive to be deterred. Without the assurance that the regime will be permitted to survive if it behaves itself, the target state might as well take a chance on obtaining the benefits of aggression... an expressed intent of forcing the other side's collapse undermines the chances that coercive diplomacy will lead to behavior modification. Without an assurance that a change in behavior will result in the lifting of the coercive pressure, why would any state give in? In contrast, coercive diplomacy is more likely to succeed when it is accompanied by positive incentives...The net benefits of changing its behavior are made greater if, in addition to the lifting of coercive pressure, the target state can also obtain new, positive rewards. This also provides a degree of face saving for the other side, which can claim it accepted a bargain and did not simply cave in to outside pressure. Coercion is most likely to be effective, therefore, if it seeks to change the other side's behavior without seeking to cause the other side's collapse and it includes the promise of positive benefits...

So. A stick and a carrot. The classic tools of conditioning. Let's look at this a little more closely. And any effort to coerce is more likely to succeed if accompanied by an opportunity.

For this deterrent threat to work, the target state must have assurance that, as long as it does not take the action being deterred, it will not suffer the threatened punishment.

Therefore, if we were truly trying to change Iran's behavior, we would be offering some positive re-inforcement, negotiations, perhaps the groundwork for some sort of diplomatic reconciliation, or something else-but something. We are not. Not only that...one thing the invasion of Iraq and the hanging of Saddam Hussein proves is that neither nations nor individuals must always be guilty, or if guilty, not of the stated charges.

If the deterrer announces plans to try to change the regime in the other state whether or not it acts aggressively, then the other side has no incentive to be deterred.

This was the whole point of Iran's inclusion on the "Axis of Evil" target list, and is considered policy by no less than General William Odom, in his testimony to the Senate..."If the president merely renounced his threat of regime change by force... " Another thing the Iraqi tragedy demonstrates is the willingness of the US to use a pretext to effect a regime change, which in Saddam's case has been sought since 1991. Iran and the US have been engaged in hostilities since 1979. Hence, Iran would be wise to assume that any excuse would do for the US, and they thus have very little to gain by cooperating.

Without the assurance that the regime will be permitted to survive if it behaves itself, the target state might as well take a chance on obtaining the benefits of aggression.

Therefore, the motive exists for an Iranian first-strike, possibly in southern Iraq, possibly in the Gulf or Straits of Hormuz, probably through its assymetrical surrogates like Hezbollah and Hamas. It seems that a goal of diplomacy, any diplomacy, should be toward reducing incentives for a first-strike, instead of provoking one. Therefore...what would a policy designed to be provocative towards Iran look like? It would threaten military action, and therefore demand a ready Iranian hair-trigger response; and it would have a covert-action component, gathering intelligence, marking targets, and probably running operations inside Iran, trying to provoke that response. It makes me wonder about this.

Research...on...attempted coercive diplomacy finds that the strategy fails much more often than it succeeds.

Simply stated, the likelihood of "success" in this impending misadventure is small. Why pursue it? Who benefits?

So. The whole point of the campaign against Iran is regime change, just as it has been since 1979 (except when Reagan was selling them weapons). There are frequent comparisons of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinijad to Adolf Hitler in the US media. US naval forces are massing in the region.

And then there are those bitterly cynical political questions re attacking Iran: benefits? risks? opportunities?
Americans will simultaneously rally around the flag and denounce the attack, splitting the country into a bitter division that politically benefits reactionary conservatives by disillusioning and demoralizing the young and newly-idealistic. The Straits of Hormuz may be closed, sending oil into a price spike, with the resultant unemployment and inflation echoing through the economy. Spiking prices means spiking profits. Hmmm. The opportunity to further extend military control over the oil resources of the Middle East, although this would require declaring victory in Iraq and sending that Army into Iran.
I think I am somewhat measured in my take of most things. However, I believe that a cold reading of the theory, juxtaposed, with the reality of our actions, lead to a conclusion: our intentions are either to start a war with Iran, provoke Iran into starting one with us, or create the climate where a mistake or accident that can be claimed as just cause will occur. I am not an alarmist...but it sure looks to me, for the first time, like Bush might really do it. If so, my current prediction is: new moon, first week of August. Knock the Democratic Convention right off the TV. Secondary prediction: new moon, 29th October. An "October Surprise" to help elect John McCain, make all of the Democrats Iraq arguments irrelevant, and put opponents neatly back into that "support the troops" trap, which no tactician has yet learned how to effectively counter. A divided and disillusioned electorate stays home in November, further helping McCain...
I reserve the right to change my mind, and I pray to the powers that I am wrong, but as I write this, I really think Bush may go for it.

God help us all. I'd like to wake up now, please.

In Case You Missed These, Part 3...

Hi everyone.
Well, it's that time again. Time to make sure some things don't get lost in the shuffle...first of all, If you are new to the site, welcome and thank you, and I hope you consider the time well spent. To you regulars, as always, thank you more...
Anyway, here are some earlier posts you may have missed...

Dien Bien Phu, Iraq
How to Start a Nuclear War by Accident
An Iran-Contra Reflection
What's a Little Espionage Between Friends?
Wrong Then, Wrong Now
First the Surrender, Then the Alliance
The Shape of the Beast
A Surge of Misunderstanding
An Open Letter to Hillary Clinton
In Case You Missed These, Part 2...

Thanks again all, and enjoy!

John McCain's Secret Identity-REVEALED!!

Ever wondered why John McCain seems so creepy, aside from the bizarre policy positions and the repudiation of all the things for which he once seemed so honorable? Man in the Street can now reveal the truth behind John McCain's secret identity:


John McCain can no longer deny it. He is The Nemesis. Once one recognizes this, suddenly, the answers to many questions become clear.

/snark

(Thanks to FDL for the McCain pic, and ResidentGamer4 for the Nemesis)

Lieberspheric Cosmology

(Credit to Jane Hamsher of FireDogLake for the title. This post is an edited form of a comment I originally left at her place.)

Lieberspheric Cosmology: The Universe as Seen Through a Veil of Utter Contempt for Joe Lieberman.

13.8 billion years ago, Joe Lieberman exploded from a point the size of a proton at many times the speed of light, an process known as “cosmic Joflation”. At this point, the natural laws of the Joniverse stabilized, light assumed its characteristic velocity, and the spirit of Joe interacted with the Higgs field to produce matter and energy. As Joe condensed into form, the shameless treachery levels and incredible density produced a warping effect on space-time-henceforth known as black JoHoles-that would suck in any positive aspect of anything and destroy it with such force that not even the light of good ideas an escape. These JoHoles sometimes form the core of entire galaxies of stupidity. The incredible energy levels generated by the collision of good sense and honor particles with the body of the Joniverse continue to fuel and accelerate the cosmic Jospansion-and Lieberspheric cosmologists predict, using new data from the W-JOE satellite, that the Joniverse will expand into infinity, as there is not enough attraction to honor and truth in the whole freakin’ Joe Lieberman Universe to cause Joe to collapse back down into a Democrat.

Arthur C. Clarke, 1917-2008: A Star Extinguished

I will keep this short, but I cannot really relate how I feel about the passing of famed author and futurist Arthur C. Clarke, without a brief explanation. 

The year was 1975, and I had just discovered a book in my school library: The Lost Worlds of 2001, by Arthur C. Clarke. It was a memoir of the writing and filming of 2001: A Space Odyssey, and included the short story The Sentinel, which had provided the initial root that would later grow into 2001. 

Well...as they say, that was all she wrote. I devoured Lost Worlds, then moved to Odyssey, and Childhood's End, Rendezvous with Rama...and on, and on, through the catalog, alternately spellbound by the visions of possible futures glimpsed as well as by the towering intellect of the author and the sheer audacity with which he would apply that intellect to problems and situations both futuristic and universal.

And it didn't stop at his fiction. The more I read, the more I learned of his early work on radar, the communication satellite, and the real-world science and engineering that undergirded all of his work, and lent both his fiction and non-fiction their credibility and air of authority. My world would never be quite the same after reading Clarke's work, and of people I never met personally, none have exerted as much  influence on my life as he. 

In the end, what Clarke did was nothing less than offer humanity one possible immortality. An immortality based on leaving Earth and spreading outward, to the planets, then the stars, beyond the reach of any single catastrophe that might depopulate a single planet. He did not offer a hope of salvation based on magic, but a solid future based on science, intellect, and the embrace of all as one human family. Should humanity find a way to survive, and escape this planetary cradle, no one will deserve more of the credit than he.

Fare thee well, Sir Arthur. May you sail beyond the sunset, and fall between the stars, like dust.

A History Teacher's Case for Obama

These videos are the product of a History teacher friend of mine, and I strongly recommend them for your consideration. While Man in the Street has endorsed no candidate since the withdrawal of John Edwards from the race, Mr. Ruane makes a powerful case for Obama, based on the historical record and the current parallels. Check it out.

An Open Letter to Hillary Clinton

(be sure to see the Sick of it Day flyer)

Dear Senator Clinton:

We've been through a lot together, you and I. I first became aware of you in '92, when you said that thing about Tammy Wynette Standing By Her Man and baking cookies, and I have to tell you, I laughed like hell. It was wonderful to see you slap the little weasel down, and I instantly admired you.

After the inauguration, the knowledge that you would be chairing the universal healthcare plan development cheered me greatly, as your very obvious intelligence, energy, and committment to the idea struck me as the ideal combination of traits necessary for the task, and though it failed, it was a noble effort; but you must know it was ultimately crippled as much by its desire to preserve the insurance industry in a paradigm when they were no longer necessary as it was destroyed by the Republican PR effort, and their corporatist allies. My admiration grew.

Then it was off to the races, through the Scaife-financed campaigns to destroy your husband's Presidency, your marriage, your family, and all through it, you remained strong, committed, someone upon whom I could hang some hopes. My huge admiration now included a huge amount of sympathy, and respect, for your toughness as well as your capacity to forgive.

Your destruction of Rudy Giuliani in the run-up to your Senate election in 2000 was a joy, and gave us an unusually popular, powerful, Democratic Senator with a national constituency, such a natural choice for a Presidential campaign, it seemed to me you would hardly have to run a primary campaign.

Then there was that vote for war thing. Not so good-you've been studying politics for as long as I have and more, so you had to have been able to see as well as I did that the case for war was built on shadows. The not voting on the bankruptcy bill thing. In the first case, it looked like you were simply trying to avoid charges of weakness and soft-on-defense, and in the second, like you were refusing to stand up against the credit-card companies, at the expense of the poor and the people teetering on the last little edge of credit before financial ruin, to avoid making a powerful political enemy, and thus help preserve your future political viability.

Hardly a profile in courage, Senator.

The enormous store of goodwill you had built up with me carried us through these dark days, however, and I greeted your Presidential run with a mixture of hope, excitement, and impatience to be rid of the mad authoritarians who've seized our Executive Branch, and...sorry.
That's for another letter.

So now we're in the primaries, all inevitable, and nobody could ever have predicted they would use planes as...I mean, nobody could ever have predicted that that Obama guy would catch fire like that, huh? Freakin' nuts!

It must really frost you to have worked so hard, and been through so much, for so long, and be so close, and then to have that skinny upstart from Chicago just walk in and take it all away...and I'm sure you're pissed. You've done the time. You've paid your dues. You've earned the shot.
However, some of the things you seem willing to do to enforce that claim disturb me greatly, Senator. Two things, in particular.

First, the negative campaigning. Senator, this has got to stop. Now. Running a negative campaign against Obama now is simply doing opposition research for McCain and the Republicans. You know this-I'm sure you remember that it was Jerry Brown who first raised the allegations about Bill, you, and Rose Law in '92, not the Republicans. Running a negative campaign against another Democrat damages the party as a whole and our chances in November, and if you take the damage the Republicans have done to this country as seriously as I do, then you know that a Democratic victory in November is imperative to reversing the catastrophe of the Bush years. Therefore, every time you run an ad saying that you and McCain are qualified and Obama is not, you are endorsing McCain over Obama (just like Lieberman). If you would do that, not just once but repeatedly, you clearly do not understand that in this war for the future, it is more important-FAR MORE important- that the victor in November be a Democrat than that it be you. The issues and risks are bigger than any one person, and the cause far bigger-and this requires the sublimation of individual egos and senses of entitlement. For you to be willing to hamstring and destroy a fellow Democrat, who may yet be your party's nominee, for your personal benefit, is a reprehensible thing, and I implore you, please, to stop the negative campaigning. If the voters decide your ideas aren't as good as his, he deserves to win. You do no one any favors by waging a campaign of personal destruction against Obama.

All for one, and one for all.

Item number two is the small matter of the superdelegates. It was interesting hearing Tom Daschle on The Daily Show, talking about how the superdelegates were set up to be able to stop someone like Steven Colbert, who might fool enough people into voting for him to get the nomination-but that's not really true, is it, Senator? It's to stop another George McGovern from getting the nomination. Oh yeah, I remember the Anybody But McGovern movement at the Convention in Miami in '72. It was far less entertaining to hear you talking about the superdelegates on 3/5, to paraphrase:"I've raised a lot of new questions about my opponent in the last two months, and the superdelegates are available to make the decision that the voters would have made if they had had this information sooner."This sounds disturbingly like saying,"It's perfectly fine for the superdelegates to throw the nomination to me even if Obama gets more delegates, because everyone who voted for him wouldn't have if they knew what I was going to say about him." This is a fundamentally un-American system, where the party bosses, established pols, and incumbents can override the voter's choice and select the nominee themselves-it sounds a lot like what Hunter S. Thompson said about Mayor Daly: he saw nothing wrong with telling his son to go round up a bunch of thugs with bullhorns and kick the shit out of anyone who challenged his right to name the next Democratic candidate for President of the United States. I urge you not to allow this sort of sham to occur-it would be the worst possible thing, a frenzy of treachery and backstabbing, and street actions in Denver of a sort not seen here in many years.

I realize this letter is running a little long, Senator, so I'll summarize:

NO MORE negative campaigning, and the superdelegates vote with their citizens. Okay? All can still be salvaged, and forgiven, but you've got to work with us.

Oh-
Tell Bill to stay the hell off the Rush Limbaugh Show. Rush is the most hateful, vile, vituperative, and successful demagogue of the last thirty years, which you most certainly know-your husband, you, your daughter, for pity's sake, were and are targets for this repulsive thug, and for Bill Clinton to go on his show to appeal to Republicans to cross open primary lines and vote for you against another Democrat is a disgrace. Think about that. Your husband doing a get-out-the-Republican-vote effort on the Rush Limbaugh program, for you, after what he said and did, and is doing, to you, your family, and the nation, to this day. I am most suspicious of Rush's preferred candidates. He would gladly see you and Bill in prison, (and tried to help put you there) yet you accept his help and Bill inflates his ratings.

It is almost dazzling.

Senator, will you denounce AND reject Rush Limbaugh?

Come back towards the light, Senator. Come back to us. There's STILL TIME!!!

Oh, and please tell Monsanto to go Cheney itself. Immediately. You know the reason why.

All of my best wishes to you and yours,
RonD

Sick of it Day

Croissant, Coffee, and Blood

(This post is a reprint of an article that appeared in Uncle John's Great Big Bathroom Reader (1998) I would like to thank all at the Bathroom Reader's Institute for their gracious permission to reprint, and I encourage all to check out their site, as well as the entire series of Bathroom Readers. They are incredibly informative as well as entertaining, and are a rich source of important bits of forgotten history-such as the following.)

Croissant, Coffee, and Blood

This article was contributed by BRI member Jeff Cheek. It's a good example of the role serendipity plays in history (and our diet). At the very least, it should make ordering a cup of coffee and a croissant more interesting.

ON THE ROPES

From July 17 until September 12, 1683, the Austrian capital of Vienna was beseiged by a Moslem army commanded by the Grand Vizier, Kara Mustafa. Historians note this as the high-water mark of Islamic influence in Europe. If the Moslems had succeeded here, it's likely they would have taken all of Europe.
After Vienna was encircled, a Polish mercenary named Kulczyski volunteered to go for help. Disguised as a Turk, he made his way through enemy lines. He was discovered, but his linguistic ability made his cover story believeable. He escaped, made his way to Bavaria, and led an 80,000-man army back to Vienna.
The Viennese people had no way of knowing this-they were completely isolated as they beat back repeated Turkish assaults on their walled city. Their outer defenses were lost, but the beseiged city held out.

ROLL TO VICTORY

In the early morning hours of September 12, a Viennese baker was preparing his dough for the next day's bread. He noticed that a tray of delicate breakfast rolls were vibrating. Why? They were acting as a seismograph, transmitting vibrations made by Turkish pickaxes. The Turks, it turned out, had decided to tunnel up to Vienna's walls, then launch a final assault. The baker sent his son to warn the city fathers, and the Austrians rushed to the ramparts just in time to repel the Grand Vizier's forces.

Kulczyski and the Bavarian army arrived a few hours later, sealing the Moslem defeat. After a bloody, 15-hour battle, the Turkish army fled, abandoning their tents and stores of food. The latter included thousands of sacks of hard, black beans, which the Austrians began to burn, because they believed the beans had no value.

A NEW TWIST

When the heroic baker was told to name his own reward, he asked to become chief baker in the royal palace. The request was granted. To impress his new masters, and to commemorate their narrow escape from the Moslems, he created a new breakfast roll. The star and crescent had long been a symbol of Islamic faith, so instead of making ordinary round or oblong rolls, he rolled the dough out, then cut it into six-inch triangles. He rolled these from the top corner, creating a humpbacked center, with tapering horns. Just before baking, he twisted these horns down, forming a crescent.

Eighty-five years later, in 1770, a tactless Austrian princess named Marie Antoinette married Louis XVI of France. To ensure her supply of crescent rolls, she brought her own bakers from Vienna. The Royal French bakers were furious at this insult, but didn't dare protest. Instead, they fought back by creating a new and better breakfast roll. They retained the crescent shape to appease Her Majesty, but used pastry dough. Thus, the noble croissant was born.

BACK TO 1683

Meanwhile, back in 1683, Kulczyski was asked what reward he wanted for saving Vienna. His request was surprisingly modest: all he asked for was the sacks of black beans that the Austrians were destroying...and permission to open a business in Vienna.

Both were immediately granted.

It turns out that while making his way through the surrounding Moslem Army, Kulczyski had been served a sweet, black beverage, which seemed to restore his energy. It was coffee-virtually unknown in Europe at that time, but a staple for the Turks.

Kulczyski collected all the Turks' unburned sacks of coffee beans and opened the first coffee house in Eastern Europe. Soon all of Europe was drinking Viennese coffee, and Kulczyski became a wealthy and respected citizen of his adopted homeland.

( For me, since I first read this nearly ten years ago, breakfast has never been the same. Again, please be sure to stop by the BRI, and say hi from Man in the Street.)

A Surge of Misunderstanding

Well, it seems there is no way to avoid wading into the "Surge" argument: on one side, as troops remain bogged down in Iraq with no end in sight, critics of the war and occupation point to the quagmire and say "the Surge has failed." On the other hand, war supporters and those with a vested interest in defending their position of advocacy point to the reductions in American combat deaths, civilian casualties, and IED encounters, and say, "the Surge is working."

Both are missing the point, one through a fundamental misunderstanding of the difference between strategy and tactics in Iraq, and one deliberately, for political gain.

Contrary to what John McCain says, the surge is not a strategy. The surge is a tactic-an action designed to produce a tangible result-one tactic, within the larger framework of an integrated conceptual plan, comprised of multiple, scaffolded operations, all designed to accomplish a strategic goal-a strategy. In World War 2, Eisenhower's instructions were to "undertake operations directed at the heart of Germany and the destruction of her armed forces." This is a strategic goal-how Ike chose to accomplish this-his tactics-were largely up to him, and it is important to note that a shift in tactics does not necessarily indicate a shift in strategy. The corresponding strategic goal in Iraq could be written as: "undertake operations designed to defuse the risk of an Iraqi civil war and create political reconciliation between the warring factions." The actual strategy would be the body of integrated operations (tactics), each built upon the success of the last, that accomplishes the strategic goal.

So, the tactics:

A surge in troop strength, along with a redeployment of forces from large concentrations into smaller, foward-operating bases, where American forces can react flexibly to local, fluid, conditions. Increased use of airpower to minimize US troop exposure. Making contact with Sunni insurgent groups and assuring them that they will be protected from a Shia-conducted genocide, and cementing the committment by supplying these same insurgent groups-so recently bombing, shooting, and killing Americans-with both money and weapons, in return for their cooperation. Using political pressure on the Shia-dominated Maliki government to reconcile with the Sunnis and the Kurds: the primary sticking points here being allocation of Iraq's oil wealth for the benefit of all Iraq, and protection of political rights for the Sunni and Kurdish minorities.

What has happened here is this: The combination of troop-strength increases and bribery has indeed improved security. US casualties, Iraqi civilian casualties, roadside-bombing, and IED incidents are all sharply down. What has failed is the reconciliation effort, easily seen in the absence of passage of any oil law and the lack of political rapproachment,-and, in the same way a tripod will collapse if a leg is removed, the US strategy in Iraq collapses, though two legs may stand tall.

On a political, Presidential-election level, the danger is this: by incorrectly lumping the entire strategy under the label "the Surge", the Democrats give John McCain and the Republicans the ability to say things like this:

"Post-surge troop strength levels have improved security. Since improved security was the goal of the surge, the surge is a success. Since we agree that the surge is the strategy in Iraq, our strategy in Iraq is therefore a success."
"What, you Democrats-you liberals-say? The Surge has failed? You are blind to reality by your own partisan bile. If the Surge has failed, how do you account for the reductions in casualties? You simply wish to raise the white flag of surrender. You are obviously dishonest, inept in international relations, and are clearly unqualified to be President."

To the layperson, this sounds convincing, and protestations to the contrary sound like the whining technicalities of someone caught in the act. Of course, the argument is predicated on the acceptance of "the Surge" as "the Strategy". No Democrat or war opponent should ever refer to the "Surge strategy". If the Democrats fall into that semantic trap, they lose the argument...and, quite possibly, the election.

No; the surge-and-bribery tactic has been a success, for now. It is the strategy that has failed.