Recycled Blogging
From a comment I put on Belgravia Dispatch:
This “insurgency is waning!” meme interests me, since it seems to have grown from nothing in the space of days like shower mold.
I’m a war critic, but nothing bores me more than obsessively detailing every single violent incident in Iraq as if any given one of them meant anything.
Fortunately, Lunaville is not so fastidious. Looking over the Today’s Attacks item from 3/28 (the most recent one posted) I see
* 6 incidents for Baghdad. 1-3 are classic Sunni insurgent attacks from the MO. 4 is probably the work of Shiite militias. 5 and 6 are ambiguous.
* Two incidents for Sadr City (listed separately from Baghdad). The location and nature of the attacks says “insurgents” (not Sadrists – or Badrists) pretty clearly.
* Two incidents for Mosul, the recruit bombing (40 dead) and a grenade attack on a police patrol – again, classic Sunni insurgent MOs in each case.
* 1 incident near Tal Al-Sakhar: ambiguous. I’m happy to call this Shiite death squad activity, since it’s a bunch of bodies turning up in a Sunni area.
* 1 incident in Tikrit. Place and manner of attack suggest Sunni insurgents.
* Dujail: one gunshot victim. Ambiguous.
* Army supplier shot dead in Yathrib. Ambiguous, though it smells like Sunni insurgent mischief.
* 1 incident in Baqubah, a bomb in one of Baby Sadr’s offices. We could only lay this at Chubby’s feet if we wanted to get rococo with our theories.
The bulk of the incidents above stem pretty clearly from the “waning” Sunni insurgency. The recruiting line bombing was actually a pretty spectacular attack, with upwards of three dozen reported dead, plus the wounded.
The NOT A CIVIL WAR OH NO marked by Shiite death squad attacks on Sunnis, some of whom are surely guilty of guerrilla activity and some of whom are surely not, is really Insurgency Plus. You can say it’s what the insurgency provoked; you can even say they’ve (the Sunnis) got it coming. What you can’t say is that it makes “Iraq the model” (to coin a phrase) that the rest of the MENA is going to want to emulate. And that was the prerequisite for victory in the war we were sold:
2. Everyone else in the Middle East decides to remake their countries in the image of Iraq.
3. No more terrorism!
I always thought it was a cockamamie plan, I admit. Because I never believed that 3 followed from 2. But on the present trajectory we’re not even going to get to 2. Because step 1 (remake Iraq) is AFU.
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March 31, 2006 @ 11:28 am
[...] Me | Main | Varieties of Civil War Posted by Kieran Healy Jim Henley: The NOT A CIVIL WAR OH NO marked by Shiite death squad attacks on Sunnis [...]
Comment by Underpants Gnome —
April 2, 2006 @ 12:26 pm
Step One: Invade Iraq
Step Three: Profit!
Comment by Chris Kidd —
April 3, 2006 @ 1:05 am
It seems there are a lot of words like ’suggests’ and ’based on the MO’. Perhaps a lot of guess work here. Having been in Iraq for about 5 months now, I have learned that not all the activity that occurs here is related to the insurgency. There is widespread crime around here that has nothing to do with the insurgency, yet somehow these crimes get lumped into the daily reports as ’Insurgent Activity’. It is easy to see why numbers and reports can look so overwhelming. The media makes no distinction between petty crime and insurgent attacks. When a Sunni farmer steals a Shia farmer’s goat, is that really an insurgent attack? What it comes down to is intent. Did that Sunni farmer steal the goat because he knew the other guy was a Shia, or was it because he was hungry and needed to feed his family? If it was for the first reason, then it could possibly be classified as a sectarian attack. But if he did it to feed his family, then it is just a crime. I know this is splitting hairs, but it is important that we not over estimate the size of the insurgency. I am not discounting the fact that there is sectarian violence right now, because I have witnessed the aftermath of at least two such attacks in the last 48 hours. But lets at least look at this insurgency and this sectarian violence through an objective lens. It seems as if the media is getting a little carried away.
Comment by Jim Henley —
April 3, 2006 @ 6:28 am
Chris, I didn’t see any goat theft reports in the list I broke down.
Let’s not get carried away with not getting carried away.
Comment by Jim Henley —
April 4, 2006 @ 10:38 pm
Anyway, Major, I would certainly be interested in your professional opinion of which incidents on the list were likely or possible crimes qua crimes as opposed to insurgent activity or sectarian strife. For instance, the Dujail murder seems, as I look at it again, like it might be basically a mob hit. OTOH, much of the list consists of roadside bomb and mortar attacks. Did you click through and read the detailed list?
Pingback by Kieran Healy’s Weblog » Blog Archive » Varieties of Civil War —
April 12, 2006 @ 12:25 pm
[...] a Revamp »
Varieties of Civil War
March 31st, 2006
Jim Henley: The NOT A CIVIL WAR OH NO marked by Shiite death squad attacks on Sunnis [...]