imagephp.jpegThe Bush/Cheney/McCain spiel that "the surge is working" has been repeated without challenge by US media so much that it’s become an article of faith. Too bad it’s not true.

As Dahr Jamail points out in this February 22, 2008 posting:

The death toll is high, according to the website icasualties.org, which provides reliable numbers of Iraqi civilian and security deaths.

In January this year 485 civilians were killed, according to the website. It says the number is based on news reports, and that "actual totals for Iraqi deaths are higher than the numbers recorded on this site."

The average month in 2005, before the "surge" was launched, saw 568 civilian deaths. In January 2006, the month before the "surge" began, 590 civilians died.

Many of the killings have taken place in the most well guarded areas of Baghdad. And they have continued this month.

They have indeed. As Chris Hedges notes:

The supporters of the war, from the Bush White House to Sen. John McCain, tout the surge as the magic solution. But the surge, which primarily deployed 30,000 troops in and around Baghdad, did little to thwart the sectarian violence. The decline in attacks began only when we bought off the Sunni Arabs. U.S. commanders in the bleak fall of 2006 had little choice. It was that or defeat. The steady rise in U.S. casualties, the massive car bombs that tore apart city squares in Baghdad and left hundreds dead, the brutal ethnic cleansing that was creating independent ethnic enclaves beyond our control throughout Iraq, the death squads that carried out mass executions and a central government that was as corrupt as it was impotent signaled catastrophic failure.

The United States cut a deal with its Sunni Arab enemies. It would pay the former insurgents. It would allow them to arm and form military units and give them control of their ethnic enclaves. The Sunni Arabs, in exchange, would halt attacks on U.S. troops. The Sunni Arabs agreed.

The U.S. is currently spending hundreds of millions of dollars to pay the monthly salaries of some 600,000 armed fighters in the three rival ethnic camps in Iraq. These fighters — Shiite, Kurd and Sunni Arab — are not only antagonistic but deeply unreliable allies. The Sunni Arab militias have replaced central government officials, including police, and taken over local administration and security in the pockets of Iraq under their control. They have no loyalty outside of their own ethnic community. Once the money runs out, or once they feel strong enough to make a thrust for power, the civil war in Iraq will accelerate with deadly speed. The tactic of money-for-peace failed in Afghanistan. The U.S. doled out funds and weapons to tribal groups in Afghanistan to buy their loyalty, but when the payments and weapons shipments ceased, the tribal groups headed back into the embrace of the Taliban.

As Carl Levin and John Warner stated earlier this month (h/t Blue Texan):

Sen. Carl Levin, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said Wednesday that the U.S. troop buildup in Iraq has failed because it hasn’t achieved its primary goal of sparking political reconciliation among that country’s rival sectarian groups. His pessimism was shared by senior Republican John Warner, who said the war is still not going as well as hoped.

…

"It is long past time that the Iraqi leaders hear a clear simple message: We can’t save them from themselves. It’s in their hands, not ours, to create a nation by making the political compromises needed to end the conflict," he added.

…

Warner, the No. 2 Republican on the panel, said there are signs of progress in Iraq and Afghanistan. "But I think by any fair standard, that level of progress to date has fallen below those expectations we’ve had as a nation," he said.

Before Bush invaded, Iraq was a functioning nation, where women could wear jeans on the buses they took to work. Now it’s a charnel house where women don’t step outside without two male relatives and a burqa — and can be raped at will by any male who wants to do so. The surge didn’t change this one bit.

By the way: concerning what even Alan Greenspan admitted was the real reason Bush invaded Iraq, here’s a blast from the past.

Seems that, in an April 14, 2005 press conference, Bush himself said that there was no need for subsidies or incentives to the oil companies if oil hit $50 $55 a barrel. ("I will tell you with $55 oil we don’t need incentives to oil and gas companies to explore. There are plenty of incentives.") Well, guess what? It will never be less than $55 a barrel — or even $65 a barrel — ever again. So why are Bush and his Republican colleagues in Congress so flatly opposed to the Democratic bill that takes the $18 billion in free money away from Big Oil and gives it to companies developing and selling renewable energy?

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