An alternative hypothesis is that they know or appreciate something that the rest of us do not. It is disquieting that no one stops to ask the question, WHY IS BUSH SO DETERMINEDLY OPTIMISTIC?
I'll speculate. The president said the other day that 5900 terrorists were killed or capture in October - November. With even back of the envelope guesstimates, this number extrapolates in astonishing ways. Suppose one were to add in Afghanistan, the insurgents' losses elsewhere in the ME (e.g., Lebanon this past summer), the Muslim on Muslim killings that go on daily in Iraq, etc., Suppose one were to look at the entire period 2002 (entry into Afghanistan) through 2008 (the earlierst we might depart). Conservatively, there must be at least 300,000 of these bad folks dead by the end, and it is easy to generate numbers exceeding 500,000. That's a lot of radicals purged. That's a lot of husbands/sons removed from planet.
Now perhaps Bush reported the 5900 b/c it was such an aberration. But the evidence and context suggest not.
Anyway, let's continue with this speculation. First, by something called Little's Law, this 5900 figure indicates that either i) there are a lot more insurgents in Iraq than we have been led to believe, or ii) the terror masters in Iran, Pakistan, and elsewhere are sending young men in the thousands every month to rather quick deaths.
Assuming that the latter is true, there are many other implications. First, this level of activity could not possibly be under the radar. Our guys must know pretty much what is going on -- the level of activity is too great to keep it secret. Second, the Michael Ledeens of the world are wrong about Bush. My question to Ledeen would be, why take more aggressive measures against Iran if they are conveniently busing all these guys to Iraq for us to line up and kill? Why make things hard on ourselves when the mullahs are making it so easy? Third, and perhaps most important, it's unlikely that the terror masters can keep this up indefinitely, and the longer they can sustain it the more comprehensive our victory will ultimately be. Iraq is like a big vacuum cleaner or, as I've seen someone else write here at FR, a big bug zapper. As long as the moths are all zooming toward 300 watt bliss, why not leave the switch on for awhile longer?
It's politically incorrect, I'm sure, for Bush to lay out his strategy in these sorts of terms, but I've got to wonder if this isn't exactly what's going down.
The politician leaders need to let the military loose. If we stop this minimalist approach, we could quickly destroy the enemy.
Yes, but Katie Couric tells me that we've already lost and that Pres Bush is a miserable failure.
/s
We are winning.
The media knows it. But theyll never admit it.
lol! 500,000? I haven't seen such pie-in-the-sky pencil whipping since the last time I read a business plan for an SBA loan for a minority business. Of course, I don't read the Congressional budgets, which is the champion, but your calculations are a strong second place!
Why can't they keep it up indefinitely?
Of course they can. Their war is cheap... Ours is determined by election cycles.
One service member is one too many to loose in a war. What gripes my a** is all this liberal talking about the deaths of our military soldiers in Iraq.
Have any of them bothered to look at the American cemeteries in France and, Germany?
We have more invested in human suffering in these two countries than we will ever have in Iraq, but the MSM will not discuss this, nor will a liberal!!!!!!!
Non carborundum illegitimus.
Exactly. In addition, as the Iraqi military become more active -- the situation is more resembling the LA Riots -- and this is what the MSM calls a "civil war".
And in re the "appeasement" vists by Kerry ad nauseum. Plays right into the Plan for Winning. Whether Dems know it or not.
Dear drellberg,
You're assuming that we're already killing all the terrorists in Iraq that we possibly could, given unlimited resources.
What seems to be happening, though, is that as we shift troops from one area to another, we efficiently kill large numbers of terrorists in the new area, but there are so many additional terrorists running around, that they're also able to re-take at least partial control in the areas that we leave.
This, of course, has the effect of subjecting the civilian populace not otherwise engaged in terrorist activities themselves to shifting control of their territory. The folks against whom we're fighting aren't exactly playing by the rules, and it is likely that they're visiting retribution on those civilians in an area who cooperated with the US military during the days or weeks that the US military was in control of the area.
This sort of thing likely makes us Americans unpopular in the parts of Iraq where this is happening. It likely also weakens the resolve of ordinary Iraqis in this area to oppose the terrorists.
In that Iraq seems to have become a sink for terrorists, and not just from Iran, it may be that we could easily raise the toll from 3,000 per month to 6,000 or even 30,000 per month, given sufficient military resources on the ground. There are nearly a billion Muslims worldwide, and it seems that a clear majority of them would like to kill all of us. Iraq could easily absorb a half-million of the scum EACH YEAR and leave plenty of Muslim terrorist wannabes at home in bed around the Middle East and the world.
Thus, "Go Big" may be the right strategy. Who knows how many more scum we might exterminate monthly given an extra 25,000 or 50,000 troops on the ground?
And let's face it. No matter WHAT happens in 2007, 2008, or beyond, whether we stick it out to win, or whether the Democrats take power and turn tail and run, every terrorist killed today is a terrorist who cannot kill us tomorrow.
Let's put up some really big numbers. Not 500,000, but more like 5 million, or more. I think numbers like that might get the attention of the vermin against whom we fight.
sitetest
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=23950
I think that 5900 announcement was for Nancy P who asserted she was sad because there was no Al Queda in Iraq about the same time that AQ boasted they were 12,000 strong.
It has been going on all along and continues to be the strategy from the 20,000 foot overview level.
Lay out the bait in Iraq and zap 'em when they come in. Thereby consolidating all fronts in the war on terror to one.
bttt
Umm, he was determinedly optimistic about the Republicans retaining control of Congress also. How'd that work out for us?
Excellent!! I believe we can and will win!
And America lost and MILLIONS of innocent people were slaughtered in the killing fields!
." The president's reply was emphatic: "We're going to win."
Who is "we?"
We've lost. We can't win because the political jerks, along with with military bureaucrats, won't let us win.
We came to a gun fight with a knife. Osama Bin Laden was correct in his assesement...we are a paper tiger.
If we can't let our military do the job of KILLING the insurgents and STOPPING Syria and Iran from funding and arming them then it's time to bring them home and stop letting them get killed or maimed for political bullcrap.
If Bush and his advisors, after 9-11, didn't know that going into Iraq was a battle in the war on terror and Iran and Syria would be in play they are inept, incompetent and criminally negligent.
How could you swat the hornet's nest and not expect to be stung? If the plan was to put a footprint in the middle of the terrorists then why not slap around the supporters? I thought we had an axil of evil. I thought you had to be with us or against us. Obviously, being against us involves no price to be paid while being with us comes with a high price when we don't act.
My suggestion: buy more guns. You're going to need them.