On the Howie Carr radio show today (8/22/07), Col. David Hunt, his substitute host, said that he had it on good (inside) authority that we were currently killing about 250 “bad guys” in Iraq every day. (This would translate into about 90,000 “bad guys” per year if we continue these favorable “surge” statistics.) And, the way I calculate it, we are losing, on average, about three American soldiers ever day in Iraq … or about 1,000 per year. This means that, if Col. Hunt’s “inside info” is accurate, the ratio of American soldier losses to bad guy losses is 90 to 1. Now we also know that enemy body count statistics are always overblown, so, to be more realistic, let us assume that we are killing terrorists, Baathists, enemy militias, and opportunistic criminals at the rate of about 60,000 per year. Since the American surge has been going on fully for only about two months, this suggests that we have recently killed about 10,000 bad guys. From this, one can suddenly understand why so many in this country are now saying that the surge is “working.” And, if we were to continue this surge for six more months (until next spring), we should punish our collective enemies in Iraq to the tune of 30,000 additional deaths. This is a non-trivial cost for these corrosive Iraqi elements to suffer … one that hopefully might not be tolerable. Admittedly, our cost would be something like an additional 500 American soldier deaths and maybe ten times that number wounded.
The question for every American then becomes, “Would it be worth it?” I understand that there are many Americans that righteously say, “Not one more American death!” But then I also understand that we have already sacrificed almost 4,000 military men and women to this effort in Iraq … with many, many more wounded. Shall we just write these deaths and injuries off to our collective misjudgment? (Remember, most of us thought that going into Iraq was a good idea and we cannot deny or wish away our resultant responsibility.) I think I know what President Bush would and will say … and this is why having his job is not to be envied.
"Oh what a web we weave...."
ReplyDeleteThis is a perfect example of how a clever muser using logical fallacies and statistics can thoughtfully and earnestly come to an inaccurate conclusion.
The first logical fallacy is to extrapolate the daily figure of enemy deaths, based on a radio personality who asserts that he has (good) connections with people who know the facts. This is just a bit reminiscent of the way we came to believe in Saddam's WMD's and the vaunted fight-to-the-death Republican Guard.
The EX-Col. earnestly wants us to believe that he has good authority - otherwise why would he be a guest on the radio? Certainly not for his pleasing radio voice or diction.
But, even if we accept that the Col. is correct about the current kill-rate, there is nothing in the history of the Iraq conflict that would lead us to believe that anything can be predicted on the basis of the current situation.
So you set up a straw man number of 90,000 based on sheer and dubious speculation; then you concoct an error factor of 30,000 with no credible supporting data other than your apparent belief that government estimates may be discounted by 33%.
This does not even approach the analysis of "who" is getting killed. You and Hunt call them "bad guys," but I wonder if we may sometimes be merely helping one faction kill off its enemies. The point is in this asymmetrical war situation, we cannot trust the assertions of self-serving individuals about kill rates or ID of the dead bodies. Remember how the "Saving Private Lynch" and Pat Tillman's death were insanely misreported?
Thus, your projections seem to be writ of smoke and mirror not to mention hypothetical speculation that the current (potentially fictitious) Trends will hold for six months. Then, after pasting together this logical house of cards, you ask us to answer the question: "Would it be Worth it?"
If we say "No." you imply that this is tantamount to "writing-off" all the previously dead and wounded. And therefore only an affirmative answer can be honorably tendered by anyone who originally supported action even if they believed the info given by our trusted authorities - that obviously there were WMD's and that Saddam was obviously planning to use them (or give them to others who would use them) on us/allies.
It is mere sophistry to conflate the initial reasons for war (Saddam's refusal to obey the UN treaty resolutions) with the subsequent rationalization for staying there: to bring Democracy to the peaceloving peoples of Iraq.
The speculation that Bush would answer Yes to the would-it-be-worth-it question tells us nothing.
Rephrase the question: "Would you sacrifice YOUR son or daughter to ensure that nine 'bad guys' were eliminated?" See how many "Yeas" you get from the patriots who support hanging in there with Bush.
Other than the above I agree with almost everything you said.