Graveyard Quiet

The Bush administration and Republicans in general are eagerly crediting the troop surge for the decline in violence in Iraq. Maybe they are partly correct. Another, probably stronger contribution is the extent of killing and displacement that has already occurred. “Ethnic cleansing” is preferred by the sensitive and those in denial.
Since the US invasion, about 100,000 Iraqis have been killed, hundreds of thousands have emigrated from Iraq, and millions have been forced to relocate within Iraq. Even the most committed killers cannot squeeze blood from a scorched earth.

The surge itself was supposed to encourage movement toward a political solution. There has been zero progress on this front but, as we saw with the WMDs, the Administration believes in being flexible with rationales and goals. Now, an improvement in a symptom of ethnic strife is being cheered as progress. While nobody can dismiss the importance of fewer people being killed, this improvement will most likely prove as transient as the others claimed by the Administration. They count on us to refocus on their next new delusion.