Don't Thank the Surge for the Drop in Iraq Violence, It's Mostly al-Sadr's Militia Laying Low til

[Dems Will Win]

February, then expect the level to go back to where it was. Al-Sadr was trying to defuse Shia in-fighting between the Badr and Sadr Brigades, but he also knows the US Army can't keep the Surge going past the March troop rotation, and that it's even getting tough to find more mercenaries to maintain the occupation.

So he's also waiting to attack when we are already on a trajectory to begin drawing down troop levels. The al-Sadr Brigade numbers about 200,000 fighters, now well-armed from oil theft revenue.

That's the real reason there was such a "phenomenal" drop in violence in the last couple of months, plus the Surge itself helped finish the sectarian division of Baghdad, which is now a collection of armed camps patrolled mostly by Sunni and Shia militia.

The Americans are now mostly back in the forts, they are no longer in the streets as they were in September. The Surge was actually a total FLOP.

It was supposed to make political unity possible. Instead it made it impossible and a lot of Americans and Iraqis lost their lives in the process.

The data released Sunday cover attacks using car bombs, roadside bombs, mines, mortars, rockets, surface-to-air missiles and small arms. According to the statistics, roughly 575 attacks occurred last week.

That is substantially fewer than the more than 700 attacks that were recorded the week that Sunni militants set off a wave of sectarian violence in Iraq by blowing up a Shiite shrine in Samarra in February 2006. And it represents a huge drop since June when attacks soared to nearly 1,600 one week.

American officials said other measures indicated that civilian deaths had dropped. Rear Adm. Gregory Smith, a spokesman for the command, said civilian deaths had dropped by 60 percent since June.

Military analysts said a number of factors explained the drop. They say, for example, that Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, a predominantly Iraqi insurgent group with foreign leadership, has been greatly weakened by American military attacks.

Thousands of new Sunni volunteers have made common cause with the Americans. About 72,000 such civilians have joined the effort, American officials said, and 45,000 each receive a $300 a month stipend from the Americans to help with the effort.

Moktada al-Sadr, the anti-American cleric, has ordered his militiamen to stand down. American military officials also say that Iran appears to be abiding by a commitment to reduce the flow of roadside bombs and other weapons into Iraq. Beyond that, many Iraqis appear to be exhausted by the sectarian violence and eager for a modicum of stability.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/19/world/middleeast/19iraq.html?ref=middleeast

But the surge's success was also due to a revolt against al-Qaida by some Sunni Arabs — first in Anbar province and later in Baghdad. Fearing al-Qaida's brutal tactics, many fighters from rival insurgent groups such as the Islamic Army in Iraq began cooperating with U.S. forces to drive the extremists from their neighborhoods and villages.

In addition, many Sunnis came to feel that Shiite religious parties posed a greater threat to their long-term Sunni interests than did U.S. forces. In part, that calculation was driven by harsh facts: Shiite militias drove tens of thousands of Sunnis from their homes last year, often with the tacit approval of Shiite-led government forces.

At the same time, Shiite attitudes toward the Mahdi Army began to change. Gunmen were seen less as protectors than as thugs, whose criminal activity drew U.S. attacks. That prompted the head of the biggest militia, Muqtada al-Sadr, to order a six-month stand down in August.

U.S. commanders were quick to exploit the changes, organizing about 70,000 Sunni fighters into neighborhood watch groups and then working to integrate them into government forces.

"Now the (ex-insurgents) are providing the security," said Amir Mohammed, 47, a Sunni merchant in the western Baghdad neighborhood of Amariyah. "Shops are open until late at night. The living standard of the people in the area is lifted."

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iytJC_yqYYxVZxixaL3GsDlNPJjQD8SSLOQO2

[sandnsea]

1. Republican argument for staying

I'd like to know which Democrat decided to cancel the attack on the surge. I haven't heard anybody talk about the Iraq government in months. If they aren't creating a cooperative government, the surge isn't working and that's all there is to it.

[acmavm]

3. If these articles are correct then our candidates will only have to wait until

February and they will have a very nasty situation to be able to point to and say 'look assholes, it ain't workin'.

But until then, what can they say? This administration and for damn sure the American public haven't been able to see any of the difficulties looming in the horizon since day one, subjectes that we discussed here even before 'Shock and Awe'.

[still_one]

2. Why would you believe something from someone who has been lying from the start?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=2330545&mesg_id=2330671

[spanone]

4. NO political progress.....

[theoldman]

5. The surge is working.

It all depends on the meaning of "is". If we stay there forever it will continue to work. As soon as we leave the killing will start up again and we will not stay there forever. I don't want to be pessimistic so I predict that in 500 years we will see peace in Iraq.