Surging downward

Alan Greenspan has a new book out today, and as is often the case with new books small excerpts are leaking out as agents and publishers attempt to build up demand for copies. However, even by such standards the one-liner making the round over the weekend seemed explosive:

"I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil."

Coming from a source such as Greenspan, this remark could be taken as particularly telling about the administration's real reasons for invading Iraq. Usually the people making such comments are left-wing, anti-war, anti-administration bloggers such as ... well ... myself. Or Liza.

Suffice to say, Greenspan doesn't fit the template.

Having thought about this some, however, and recognizing I have not read the book yet, I find it unlikely Greenspan is claiming the primary reason we invaded Iraq was oil, but rather that the reason we care about the region at oil is the oil reserves there, and Saddam was seen as a destabilizing force in an area we cared about. It's a small, but important distinction - had Saddam existed in, say, central Africa, he may still have been a destabilizing force but we likely wouldn't have invaded his nation, simply because there is nothing there we care about as much as we care about middle-Eastern oil.

Update: Greenspan seems to support this take in a Wall Street Journal interview available here.

Regardless of our rationale for the initial invasion, however, the supposed rationale behind the escalation this year took another body blow over the weekend when the faction of Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr announced Saturday it would withdraw its support for Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki. Considering the Sadr faction had a significant hand in al-Maliki's being able to establish a parliamentary majority in the first place, this is another real body blow to the ability of the Iraqi government to continue to rule at all, much less effectively, at least as it is currently constituted.

The underlying purposes for sending more troops to Iraq was supposed to be to provide the government there "breathing space" to make some hard, but necessary, decisions regarding the future of the country. Instead, the government continues to spiral into chaos. I'm sure the administration will see that simply as further justification to keep troops there - if things are going well we need to keep troops there because things are going well, if things are going poorly we need to keep troops there because things are going poorly. Staying in Iraq is a tautology.

Meanwhile, there is an interesting new research paper (hat tip to Freakonomics) analyzing the data from the Iraq surge from an economist's stand point. The entire paper is worth a read, and the author concludes the signs are mixed, with casualty data (both civilian and military) pointing to the surge making some progress, but other data pointing toward a deteriorating situation.

However, the most interesting point, and most telling, is the author's analysis of the Iraqi bond markets - he determines that since the surge began, confidence in the ability of the Iraqi government to repay bonds it sells has fallen by 40%. Given the generally well-established track record of financial markets in predicting the future, this is pretty damning.

Combine it with the news last week that Hunt Oil Co., who's CEO Ray Hunt is on the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, has struck a deal with the Kurdistan National Assembly to explore and drill in the Kurdish region, without the Iraqi government being included in the negotiations or contract, and it becomes increasingly clear which way the smart money is betting - against the administration.

Given the respective track records, that certainly seems the way to go.

A bad day in Baghdad

A series of five explosions rocked Baghdad yesterday, killing at least 171 people and wounding hundreds more. The worst was an explosion at a bus hub, which by itself killed 140+ and wounded 150 or more. The bombings have continued today, with an explosion killing 10 more. The day is still young.

Yesterday's violence was the worst in the Iraqi capital since the administration, disdaining the will of the people who elected him, launched his escalation there. Not surprisingly, despite the news being overshadowed by the Virginia Tech nightmare, the Supreme Court abortion ruling and the Gonzales testimony, some commentators are taking the opportunity to use it as a sign the escalation is already a failure. Thoughtful blogger x4mr makes a small allusion to this in a post he made last night.

I responded to x4mr's post, but wanted to expand on my thoughts here. I am opposed to the escalation and want us out of Iraq. However, just as I am frustrated when global warming sceptics try to use a single data point to dispute the seriousness (or even existence) of the problem (as in "hey, we just had a record storm in the Northeast - when does global warming kick in again?? "), using a single data point to claim the escalation is not working is the same logical fallacy.

So ... let's look for more data points.

McClatchy provides some good information regarding US casualties in Iraq here, including an Excel spreadsheet with month-by-month tallies of US deaths, with a breakout for those in Baghdad. While the article accurately notes the last six months have been the deadliest six-month period for US troops since the war began, those figures are skewed by high figures in Oct. and Dec. of 2006, two of the five deadliest months of the war for US forces, and both occurring prior to the start of the "surge". Casualties in Feb. and Mar. of 2007 are much closer to the established baseline (which has, admittedly, trended up since the start of the war).

However, the first half of April (McClatchy's figures were posted Apr. 16) has been quite bad, and if the rate continues April will rank among the worst of the war for US casualties. Of course, the key words are "if the rate continues". It's also possible the recent convulsions will be followed by a lull, and the US casualty total for the month will be at or near the baseline.

(As an aside, US casualties within Baghdad have certainly trended up since the escalation, but that's to be expected with the extra combat missions occurring there.)

Looking at civilian casualty figures, the AP reported on April 13 that in the two months since the surge began civilian casualties in Baghdad has dropped to 1,586, down from 2,871 in the two months prior to the escalation. This was somewhat offset by an increase in civilian deaths outside the capital, rising from 1,009 in the two months prior to the surge to 1,504 in the two months since.

(I considered making some tallies of my own using the data available here, but that much time and energy I simply don't have. I wish the provided the DB or Spreadsheet containing the data so I could run some queries against it.)

Sooo ... what are my conclusions? Heck if I know. US casualties may jump some, but that's not yet clear. Iraqi civilian casualties do seem to be down. In general, though, despite some recent high-profile events (Wednesday's bombings, the bombing within the Green Zone), the overall figures don't yet show enough to make decisive statements for or against the efficacy of the surge.