| By Dave Harding, ProgressOhio - Sep 10th, 2007 at 5:19 pm EDT |
| Also listed in: Americans Against Escalation in Iraq | Ohio Bloggers | Interfaith Peace Coalition |
Categories: Honest and Ethical Government, National Security, Media Accountability, Peace and Armed Conflict
“Gen. David Petraeus went before a deeply divided Congress on Monday, to report "the surge is working" while the news out of Iraq was less positive:
BAGHDAD (AP) — Nine American soldiers were killed in Iraq today, including eight who died in vehicle accidents that also claimed the lives of two detainees, the military said.
The deadliest of the vehicle accidents, in western Baghdad, killed seven Multi-National Division — Baghdad soldiers and wounded 11, and left two detainees dead and a third injured. The cause of the accident was under investigation, the military said.
In a separate accident, east of Baghdad, an American soldier was killed and two injured when their vehicle flipped and caught fire. A ninth soldier died of injuries sustained Sunday while on patrol in the Kirkuk area of northern Iraq.
You can argue whether Move-On went to far with their ad, or whether the Petraeus is "cooking the books" with his statistics. I suppose you could argue whether the American public wants the troops home as polls demonstrate, but you can't argue with 9 more dead.
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Maybe somebody's finally doing something right?
In fact, the chart you link to shows more Americans have died every month this year than in the same month in '06.
What looks like a big drop in September is because September 07 is only through the first 9 days . . . adding the 9 more who died today brings September '07's total to 42 in the first 10 days of the month.
American deaths are clearly rising rather than falling as you conclude . . .
What's worth pointing out is that the troop increase reached its peak in mid-June of this year, and through the end of August the number of American kids killed by hostile action has been dropping steadily.
I mean no disrespect here, but I've studied statistics enough to know a mistaken use when it's offered. Now, we could compare August '07 to August '06, and July '07 to July '06, and things would look bad to the untrained eye. But that's not the way to compare data here. You'd compare data from the same month in successive years if you were trying to spot seasonal patterns (like a hotel comparing this year's spring break occupancy with last year's). I don't think the seasonal approach applies here.
What we ought to do is identify when a certain strategic approach begins, then track the trends in American deaths by hostile action.Then, when a significant shift in strategy takes place, we flag that point in time and track the trends afterward. If the deaths were high and growing during Strategy A, but the deaths started dropping after switching to Strategy B ... then there's something going on that we ought to examine.
Of course the shift in strategy isn't the only variable in play here. As any statistician knows, correlation isn't always proof of causation. War is horribly messy and complex and (in many ways) irrational. But we need to look at what else changed in Iraq from around June of '07 onward. Something (or maybe several somethings) caused American deaths to drop, and it happened right about the time that the troop escalation reached its peak. If we can't find some other good explanation, then we'll have to conclude that the troop escalation probably had something to do with it.
Follow me?
but see they're coming down over the last 2 months. ("coming down" from 3 of the highest monthly death tolls ever since the war began).
For the last 2 months (July and August '07) monthly American death tolls have been 88 a month (15% higher than the monthly average for the entire war and higher than any July or August in the 4 years since the war began). . . but apparently your point is that they're down in the those 2 months from the three previous months in which they they average 119 (the highest number of any 3 month period in the war) and you present that as "statistical evidence" the surge is working?
I heard once that you get to have your own opinions, but you don't get to have your own facts . . . though you can try to manipulate presentation of the facts to match your opinions, beliefs, or other purposes which of course is exactly what the Bush Administration, General Petraeus, Ambassador Crocker, and you are doing right now.
Lastly, they're not just numbers they're people, somebody's son, daughter, brother or sister. Everyone of those "statistics" had a face before they perished in the occupation of Iraq.
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Brian over at Plunderbund who does know his numbers responds.
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