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April 06, 2006
We're losing in Iraq
At least that's the impression you'd get from reading and watching the MSM.
But a look at the numbers -- stripping out the bias of the anti-America media -- shows a very different story.
81, 76, 50, 49, 43, 25
What are these numbers? This week’s Powerball winners? ... No, they’re the number of troops that have died in hostile actions in Iraq for each of the past six months. That last number represents the lowest level of troop deaths in a year, and second-lowest in two years.
But it must be that the insurgency is turning their assault on Iraqi military and police, who are increasingly taking up the slack, right? 215, 176, 193, 189, 158, 193 (and the three months before that were 304, 282, 233).
Okay, okay, so insurgents aren’t engaging us; they’re turning increasingly to car bombs then, right? 70, 70, 70, 68, 30, 30.
Civilians then. They’re just garroting poor civilians. 527, 826, 532, 732, 950, 446 (upper bound, two months before that were 2489 and 1129).
My point here is not that everything is peachy in Iraq. It isn’t. My point isn’t that the insurgency is in its last throes. It isn’t. My point here isn’t even to argue that we’re winning. I’m at best cautiously-pessimistic-to-neutral about how things are going there. ... My only point is that ... I was unequivocally shocked when I saw this. Completely the opposite of what I’d expected. My non-scientific sample of three friends, all of whom are considerably more bullish about the prospects in Iraq than I am, revealed three people similarly surprised by these numbers.
More analysis on what it all means over at the Belmont Club.
Posted by Mike Lief at April 6, 2006 07:31 AM
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