Scrutinizing Petraeus's Record

[marct]

Hi Uboat,

I'm going to address this one because I am sick and tired of hearing it. First of all the "surge" is not nor was it ever the new strategy. The surge is simply a means to provide more troops to facilitate the new strategy. The new strategy is about pushing more troops out of the FOBs and getting them out where they can do more good. The commanders on the ground did not wait for the surge to start implementing this. Yes, the Anbar awakening started before the surge but without help from us it would have died there. No one is lying about it and I am sick and tired of hearing people who do not have enough information to have an opinion on the issue make grand sweeping statements like "We're being lied to."

Well, without speaking for RA, I took his points as being "popular understandings" more than anything else. Of course the surge isn't a strategy, but it has been spun as one by a number of politicians and some media who conflate the surge with a strategy. Since most non-military people use the term "strategy" to cover everything from "how I am going to make breakfast" to "how I will penetrate the Chinese market and achieve world widget domination", I really don't find it surprising that they can't distinguish between them.

What I saw RAs list as was a series of reasons (actually, emotional responses, not rational thought) why the "common man" doesn't believe pretty much anything coming out from "official sources" - the blocks to communicative legitimacy as it were.

[tequila]

Releasing contradictory data about important metrics does not help.

[Uboat509]

Hi Uboat,
Well, without speaking for RA, I took his points as being "popular understandings" more than anything else. Of course the surge isn't a strategy, but it has been spun as one by a number of politicians and some media who conflate the surge with a strategy. Since most non-military people use the term "strategy" to cover everything from "how I am going to make breakfast" to "how I will penetrate the Chinese market and achieve world widget domination", I really don't find it surprising that they can't distinguish between them.

What I saw RAs list as was a series of reasons (actually, emotional responses, not rational thought) why the "common man" doesn't believe pretty much anything coming out from "official sources" - the blocks to communicative legitimacy as it were.

My issue is not so much that he does not understand what the strategy is but rather that he takes what little knowledge he has and makes the leap to "We're being lied to."

SFC W

[Rank amateur]

My issue is not so much that he does not understand what the strategy is but rather that he takes what little knowledge he has and makes the leap to "We're being lied to."

SFC W

Fair enough. We feel like we're being lied to. Like I said above, we feel how we feel. It's our right. Once people are wrong about, "WMDs," dead enders" and "mission accomplished," we're allowed to stop listening. We're allowed to feel like we're being lied to. We don't need to believe "we've finally figured out what we're doing."

For the record though, I know the difference between tactics and strategy. The strategy - last I heard - was to reduce violence, in order to create "breathing space" which would lead to reconciliation. I think most people admit the strategy isn't working.



I suspect that the new strategy is to try some different tactics and see if something salvageable emerges from the chaos, which makes some sense. Or it's to arm the Sunni in order to curb Iranian influence and no one has the courage to admit that our strategy is arming the ones who killed us and who used to work for Saddam. (Of course, my last suggestion may be caused by my incorrect belief that I've been lied to. I have biases just like everyone else.)

PS: When you're talking about hearts and minds, pictures are almost always more effective than words. I was thinking about how stupid the anti Paetreus moveon.org ad was and thinking that they should've run the above picture with the headline, "Do you want America's best and bravest to die in order to give Maliki more time?" But that was just off the top of my head. I'm sure I could come up with a pretty good pro war ad too. It wouldn't use any of the following terms: Bush, Maliki, surge or benchmarks. I'd probably go with some version of Petraeus knows what he's doing and he deserves our support. He seems to be the only one the public trusts, so it makes sense to reinforce those beliefs. Or maybe I'd let RTK talk directly to the camera about why he wants to go back to Iraq. It depends on whether or not RTK could talk calmly about Iraq for 30 seconds without raising his voice.

[RTK]

Or maybe I'd let RTK talk directly to the camera about why he wants to go back to Iraq. It depends on whether or not RTK could talk calmly about Iraq for 30 seconds without raising his voice.

You'd be suprised how many times you've probably seen me on camera doing just that without knowing it.

[Rank amateur]

Well, without speaking for RA, I took his points as being "popular understandings" more than anything else..

You would be the most educated person who ever spoke for me so don't worry about it.

From The President's official web site

Our Success In Meeting Surge Objectives Allows Us To Begin Bringing Some Of Our Troops Home. The premise of our strategy is that securing the Iraqi population is the foundation for all other progress. This week, General Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker testified before Congress and made clear that our challenge in Iraq is formidable. Yet they concluded that conditions in Iraq are improving, that we are seizing the initiative from the enemy, and that the troop surge is working.

If you'd dumped your chief spokesperson after "Mission Accomplished" you might have more support. People listen to the Commander in Chief. If he's wrong too many times in a row, they stop listening. That's marketing. That's the hearts and minds of most American people.