Sunday, May 25, 2008

Flickering Out

It is difficult to portray this as anything but a good statistic:

The U.S. military says attacks have dropped dramatically — down to an average of 41 a day across the country, the lowest rate since 2004 — amid the crackdowns and truces.


Remember that the number includes small arms fire, indirect fire (mortars and rockets) and roadside bombs--including bombs discovered by our troops as well as those that go off. Back in 2004, this would have included more small arms fire and fewer roadside bombs, I think. As time progressed, the enemy resorted to roadside bombs more and more. And we are better at spotting those roadside bombs today. So the same level of attacks as in spring 2004 (by August 2004, I recall the level was up to 90 per day, although I think we started counting attacks differently in April 2004, making comparisons a little difficult prior to this) is a less effective level of fighting against us. And we have far more government forces to fight the enemy today than in 2004.

Our enemies have not yet been able to adapt to the gains made by the surge. It looked like the Iranians and their Sadrist hand puppets had attempted to go on offense, but the Iraqi government knocked them back in Basra and the south of Iraq, while we and the Iraqis knocked them about in Sadr City.

The Sunni Arab resistance in flickering out. The Shia resistance is failing to catch fire. And the Kurds seem to be content not to overreach.

We are winning this war. Will our Left celebrate this growing success? They've always said their opposition to the war was based on their superior knowledge that led them to conclude we could not win the war rather than just being pro-defeat. So logically, the Left will celebrate along with war supporters over this trend toward victory.