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U.S. in danger of losing the war
Analysis finds troubling trends in Iraq: Rising fatalities, attacks
January 22, 2005
BY TOM LASSETER and JONATHAN S. LANDAY
DETROIT FREE PRESS WASHINGTON STAFF
BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Unless something dramatic changes, the United States is heading toward losing the war in Iraq.
A Knight Ridder Newspapers analysis of U.S. government statistics shows the U.S. military steadily losing ground to the predominately Sunni Muslim insurgency in Iraq.
The analysis suggests that, short of a newfound will by Iraqis to reject the insurgency or a large escalation of U.S. troop strength, the United States won't win the war.
Military thinkers say insurgencies are especially hard to defeat because the insurgents' goal isn't to win in a conventional sense but to survive until the will of the occupying power is sapped. Recent polls suggest an erosion of support among Americans for the war.
The unfavorable trends are clear:
Combat deaths: U.S. military fatalities from hostile acts have risen from an average of about 17 per month just after President George W. Bush declared an end to major combat operations on May 1, 2003, to an average of 82 per month.
WOUNDED: The average number of U.S. soldiers wounded by hostile acts per month has spiraled from 142 to 808 during the same period. Iraqi civilians have suffered even more deaths and injuries, although reliable statistics aren't available.
INSURGENT ATTACKS: Attacks on the U.S.-led coalition since November 2003, when statistics were first available, rose from 735 a month to 2,400 in October. Air Force Brig. Gen. Erv Lessel, deputy operations director of the multinational forces, said Friday that attacks were currently running at 75 a day, about 2,300 a month, well below a spike in November during the assault on Fallujah but nearly as high as October's total.
BOMBINGS: The average number of mass-casualty bombings has grown from zero in the first few months of the U.S.-led occupation to an average of 13 per month.
ELECTRICITY: Electricity production has been below prewar levels since October, largely because of sabotage by insurgents, with just 6.7 hours of power daily in Baghdad in early January, according to the State Department.
OIL: Iraq is pumping about 500,000 barrels of oil a day fewer than its prewar peak of 2.5 million barrels per day as a result of attacks, according to the State Department.
"All the trend lines we can identify are all in the wrong direction," said Michael O'Hanlon of the Brookings Institution, a Washington policy research organization. "We are not winning, and the security trend lines could almost lead you to believe that we are losing."
The combat numbers are based mainly on Defense Department releases compiled by O'Hanlon. Since the numbers can fluctuate significantly from month to month, Knight Ridder examined the statistics for fatalities, injuries, and mass-casualty bombings using a technique mathematicians call a moving average -- averaging the number of attacks in one month with the number of attacks in the two months immediately preceding it in order to better reveal the underlying trend.
Lessel said that since the U.S. assault on the former rebel stronghold of Fallujah in November, "we have been making a lot of progress" against the insurgency.
He said the number of attacks, bombings and kidnappings is down from November, experienced insurgent leaders are being arrested or killed and U.S. and Iraqi forces remain on the offensive.
He also pointed to surveys that show 80 percent of Iraqis wanting to vote in the Jan. 30 elections and more than 90 percent opposing violence as a solution to the crisis. In addition, the recruitment and training of Iraqi security forces are being stepped up, Lessel said.
"I don't want to paint too rosy a picture. We still have an insurgency that has a lot of capabilities," he said. "When you ask is the insurgency growing, you have to ask is it growing in terms of popular support, and I don't see that happening."
There are some additional bright spots.
Millions of dollars are pouring into reconstruction efforts in the Sadr City neighborhood of Baghdad and the southern town of Najaf, the scene of intense fighting last year with Shi'ite rebels. Both places are now relatively peaceful, and the danger of a spreading insurgency backed by Iraq's Shi'ite majority has been largely thwarted.
About 14 million Iraqis, mostly Shi'ites, are registered to vote in the elections for an interim 275-seat National Assembly.
About 1,500 U.S.-funded reconstruction projects are employing more than 100,000 Iraqis, and the insurgents' campaign of attacks and threats has failed to deter sign-ups for Iraq's new security forces.
Despite these developments, however, the insurgency is getting larger. Through all the major turning points that raised hopes of peace in Iraq, from the capture of Saddam Hussein to the handover of sovereignty seven months ago, the country's insurgency has become deadlier and more effective.
Insurgency grows larger, smarter
At the close of 2003, U.S. commanders put the number of insurgents at 5,000. Earlier this month, Gen. Mohammed Abdullah Shahwani, the director of the Iraqi intelligence service, said there are 200,000 insurgents, including at least 40,000 hard-core fighters. The rest, he said, are part-time fighters and supporters who provide food, shelter, money and intelligence.
"Many Iraqis respect these gunmen because they are fighting the invaders," said Nabil Mohammed, a Baghdad University political science professor.
The resistance has grown despite suffering huge casualties to overwhelming U.S. firepower. Exact statistics aren't available.
The insurgents "are getting smarter all the time. We've seen a lot of changes in their tactics that say, one, they're getting help from outside, and two, they're learning," said Sgt. 1st Class Glenn Aldrich, 35, of Houston, a 16-year Army veteran, after spending an hour recently greeting Iraqis on a foot patrol through a Baghdad neighborhood.
Insurgent attacks have shifted from small groups of men shooting at tanks with AK47s to powerful car bombs and roadside explosives and well-planned assaults, kidnappings and assassinations.
U.S. soldiers have subdued Sunni hotbeds such as Fallujah and Samarra. Yet these military victories have failed to achieve the broader goal of weakening the resistance.
Hopes come with dire warnings
The Bush administration hopes to replace the 150,000 U.S. troops with well-trained Iraqis. And Bush administration officials say the program to train and equip new Iraqi security forces of more than 272,000 members is making progress.
Yet several independent experts said it would take at least two years before there are any meaningful numbers of Iraqi forces with counterinsurgency skills and as many as five years before the U.S. goal is attained.
"I think you can achieve success, but it will take a while and, unfortunately, there will be a lot more blood," said Peter Khalil, who was a senior security adviser to the U.S.-led occupation authority in Iraq.
U.S. military officials have repeatedly and accurately predicted more violence in the approach to the elections, which are likely to bring to power a Shi'ite-dominated government after nearly a century of Sunni rule in Iraq.
Hopes that the elections might lessen the violence recently have given way to more dire warnings, with expectations that Sunni insurgents who feel disenfranchised in the new Iraq will turn their guns on the elected government.
"I think that we will enter a different but still dangerous period in the postelection time frame," Brig. Gen. Carter Ham, the commander of U.S. forces in northern Iraq, said on Jan. 15.
Bush has promised to stay the course.
Contact TOM LASSETER at
tlasseter@krwashington.com and
JONATHAN S. LANDAY at jlanday
@krwashington.com. Ken Dilanian of the Philadelphia Inquirer contributed to this report.
...btw, sorry that took so long.