Ian Lewis' Blog

I just read on BBC that the figures of civilian deaths are generally inflated or exaggerated. It appears that media outlets are taking witness accounts but not verifying the number of deaths when the witnesses themselves may not know all the facts or are pressured to exaggerate the numbers. It seems that the insurgents are pressuring people to report higher numbers than are accurate.

From the article:

"Gen Azimi from the defence ministry said the Taleban regularly forced villagers to phone media outlets with inflated figures, threatening to behead them if they did not do so."

There has been somewhat of a debate before about whether insurgents are carrying out attacks to cause media attention. Many liberal bloggers or commentators have said that the real reason is likely that they are just struggling for power etc. and that the media attention is not really a insurgent objective. While I'm far from a conservative I found the notion that insurgents commited attacks in such a way that it attracts the most media attention to be entirely believable. This just gives evidence to the fact that the insurgents are using the media to affect the war.

Unfortunately, arguing about such a thing is really pointless as it doesn't change the situation on the ground in Iraq. The only thing we could do with this information is use it as a reason to increase or not-decrease war spending. But we are already spending too much on a conflict that we dubiously started in the beginning.

I used to think that the war was a mistake but that staying in Iraq was better than pulling out because Iraq would immediately spiral into civil war and become like Afganistan was before the war, ruled by regional warlords (e.g. Business as usual in the Middle East). But over the last year, I've started thinking it's inevitable. There is nothing that the U.S. could possibly do at this point to stop it. Whether we end the occupation tomorrow or 5 years from now it won't stop Iraq from spiraling into a bigger conflict the second we reduce numbers. Even if we stay for the indefinite future, such as having a situation like Korea and staying in Iraq 50+ years as President Bush has hinted at, we would never be able to justify the occupation to the world or the American or Iraqi people. It would always be seen (and rightly so) by most in and outside the U.S. as protecting U.S. oil interests in the Middle East with occupation.