McCain and the Surge Myth

John McCain has made his support for the "surge" in Iraq one of the central issues of his campaign for President. McCain touts his early support for the surge to highlight his foreign policy experience and judgment. In reality, the surge is not the primary, or even secondary, reason for the decline in violence in Iraq.

First and foremost, the U.S placed the Sunni insurgents on the Pentagon payroll, paying them to stop killing our troops and Iraqi civilians. These former insurgents are known as the Sunni Awakening, or the "Sons of Iraq". The Sons of Iraq form an 80,000-100,000 man militia and the Pentagon (i.e., you and me) pays each militia member $300 a month. Based on 80,000 men; that is $24 million a month, or $288 million per year. That is only a fraction of the wars trillion dollar cost; but what happens when we stop paying (bribing) these former thugs and killers? My guess is that they revert to being thugs and killers.

Five years after Bush declared "mission accomplished", the U.S. still has no understanding of sectarian tension in the country. Iraq's Shiite-dominated government have strong reservations about an 80,000 strong Sunni militia, and believe the militia is a threat to lasting peace. Many of the movement's leaders leaders have been arrested and the government will not honor U.S pledges to employ the militia members, potentially leading to renewed sectarian violence (and ending the success of the surge).
(Sources: McClatchy and LA Times)

Second, is the fact that the ethnic cleansing in Baghdad is complete. Sectarian violence has declined because the Shiites have successfully cleansed Baghdad of a large portion of it's Sunni population. There are no longer mixed Shiite/Sunni neighborhoods in Bagdhad, so there is no longer sectarian violence. The mainstream media seldom mention that Iraq has 2 million refugees residing mostly in Jordan and Syria and another 2 million internally displaced persons.
(Sources: CS Monitor, Reuters, UCLA Study and Informed Comment)

McCain does not want to be held accountable for his support of the initial unjust and immoral invasion and occupation of Iraq that resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqis, millions of Iraqi refugees, and 4000 dead Americans (and counting). Yet he is happy to use his support of the poorly understood surge to his political benefit.

According to McCain's logic, if you shoot yourself in the foot; seeking immediate medical attention afterward is the lesson learned. Whereas, to a sane man, the lesson learned is not to play with loaded guns.