Surge Overkill
Wow. The Pentagon has started classifying the “insurgent attacks” numbers that have been tracked by Brookings and GAO since the end of Really Freaking Major Combat Operations in 2003, the ones that show the seasonal ratcheting increase in insurgent violence over the last three years. This is going to totally hose the Big Sekrit Projekt I was trying to rope BruceR into. And it’s also, you know, pathetic.
A government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not bear any resemblance to what we’ve got now.
UPDATE: And, they’re back! (Warning: PDF.)
Comment by Alex from Inactivist —
December 16, 2006 @ 8:51 pm
Will the classification be retroactive? Will news outlets be required to edit archived footage and web pages?
I’m just glad that from now on we’ll hear only good news about the war against Eurasia. The bad news is bad for our troops and should just be sent down the memory hole.
Comment by Nell —
December 17, 2006 @ 10:15 am
When I first heard this (somebody posted about it about a week ago), I assumed they’d withheld the numbers for the election campaign. But if that were true, they’d have released the November numbers.
Something for Carl Levin’s already full plate. Or maybe they’ll quietly release them on Christmas Day, when no one’s paying attention.
Speaking of which, I found this post by David Kurtz at TPM to be a much-needed splash of water. The Appeal for Redress has come into existence in the nick of time; we’re dealing with an escalation here, and antiwar advocates need to respond now.
Comment by ran —
December 17, 2006 @ 8:30 pm
The facts have a well known antiwar bias.
Comment by Nell —
December 18, 2006 @ 4:21 pm
Okay… looks to me as if this was an election ploy that they thought they’d continue with if no one complained too loudly. But someone did, and we’ll see in the next hour if they’ve been embarrassed into backtracking.
Comment by Jim Henley —
December 18, 2006 @ 5:08 pm
Ooh! Weird election ploy, trying to say “violence is increasing because the insurgents can read the American political calendar!” will hiding the data showing violence increasing. What a bunch of goofs rule us.
Comment by Eric Martin —
December 18, 2006 @ 6:08 pm
Backtrackage?
Comment by Nell —
December 19, 2006 @ 12:16 am
Here’s the Pentagon doc itself, via Justin Rood at TPM Muckraker, who says that it doesn’t record the numbers in the same way as previously. I think. I’m too tired to check that out, hoping someone will have done that by tomorrow evening.
Jim, I’d forgotten about the whole ‘insurgents intensifying attacks to affect our elections’ claim. I honestly didn’t pay much attention to what Republicans were saying this fall. It blessedly finally stopped working with a chunk of other people, too.
So… this decision to withhold the info is just part of the steady lowering of the curtain on the public? TPMM’s on that case too.
Comment by Nell —
December 19, 2006 @ 12:26 am
Truly too tired to type; I didn’t see the update before I posted.
Am I right in thinking that these aren’t the numbers of attacks on coalition forces that DoD used to release separately each month, but related numbers that are part of the quarterly reports to Congress? So that, strictly speaking, they aren’t quite back?