Numbers Game

General William Casey, who according to John McCain is the ONLY person responsible for everything that's gone wrong in Iraq (I guess he sets the policy, too, huh St. McCain?), testified today that to secure Baghdad would take only half of the troops Bush will appropriate to the cause.

Testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee on his nomination to be Army chief of staff, Gen. George Casey said he had asked for two additional Army brigades, based on recommendations of his subordinate commanders. Bush announced Jan. 10 that he would send five extra brigades as part of a buildup that would total 21,500 soldiers and Marines.

Asked by Sen. John Warner, R-Va., why he had not requested the full five extra brigades that Bush is sending, Casey said, "I did not want to bring one more American soldier into Iraq than was necessary to accomplish the mission."

So according to the general on the ground, we need 10,000 troops. (For the record, I think this is absurdly low, and to pull off a real counter-insurgency strategy we'd need 10 times that). According to the commander-in-chief, we need 20,000. But according to the Congressional Budget Office, we're sending twice that:

A study released today by the Congressional Budget Office shows that the real troop increase associated with President Bush’s escalation policy could be as high as 48,000, more than double the 21,500 soldiers that Bush has claimed.

As DefenseTech notes, extra forces are expected because the combat units being sent into Iraq “need to be backed up by support troops, ‘including personnel to staff headquarters, serve as military police, and provide communications, contracting, engineering, intelligence, medical, and other services.’” The CBO’s low estimate envisions at least 15,000 additional support personnel. The alternative scenario “would require about 28,000 support troops in addition to the 20,000 combat troops.”

In actuality, if you count all the contractors working in military support capacities in Iraq, we have well over 200,000 troops there. And adding in their casualties (about 800), this war has cost nearly 4,000 American lives. But it's much more palatable to focus on the combat troops, even though everybody is a target, just look at Karbala and other attacks on US bases and the security personnel deaths.

You can manipulate numbers all you want to suit political needs. The fact is that this is a major escalation, which will result in almost a quarter of a million American citizens stuck in the middle of a civil war. This is why everyone needs to call their Senators today and tell them to oppose this nonsense and get the troops home.