Surge: What's the Use?

Obviously, the giant news of the day is Bush's plan for more troops in Iraq. And I have to say, I'm having trouble getting my arms around the story. Because I can't find anyone -- anyone -- that thinks this "surge," this "escalation," is a good idea. That believes it will truly deliver a significant impact.

So I'm asking the Republican die-hards out there -- the folks who are deeply committed in their support of the President, the people who think he's done a solid job, given extremely difficult circumstances -- for a little help. Let's hear from you, either in the comments here or on my blog, DefenseTech.org: Do you really think adding 20,000 troops is going to make much of a difference in Iraq? And if so, how?

Don't get me wrong. For more than three years, I've had soldiers complaining to me about the lack of boots on the ground. About how winnable this war might be with more troops. But these guys didn't want a 10 or 15 percent increase in manpower, like the President will call for tonight. They wanted several divisions to join 'em. Enough troops to completely blanket the country -- or at least to pull off the classic counterinsurgency move of clearing out neighborhoods of guerrillas, and holding the areas for the good guys.

As Slate's Fred Kaplan notes, incoming Iraq commander Gen. David Petraeus and his co-authors "discussed this strategy at great length" when they put together the Army's new counterinsurgency field manual.

One point they made is that it requires a lot of manpower -- at minimum, 20 combat troops for every 1,000 people in the area's population. Baghdad has about 6 million people; so clearing, holding, and building it will require about 120,000 combat troops.

Right now, the United States has about 70,000 combat troops in all of Iraq (another 60,000 or so are support troops or headquarters personnel). Even an extra 20,000 would leave the force well short of the minimum required -- and that's with every soldier and Marine in Iraq moved to Baghdad. (emphasis mine)

Which we all know ain't gonna happen. Like Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America chief Paul Rieckhoff said on MSNBC the other day: "This is not like a Hail Mary pass on the part of the President. This is like calling a draw play when you're down big in the 4th quarter." A half-effort, that's not going to win the game.

It doesn't even seem like the surge's intellectual authors even back the plan. Gen Jack Keane, who helped push the idea to the White House, called for 32,000 troops -- 50% more than what the President is supposed to ask for.

John McCain, Congress' most visible backer for more troops, is squirming, too. On the Today show last week, the Senator was asked if 20,000 more soldiers would be enough. His answer: "I'm not sure... To make it of short duration and small size would be the worst of all options to exercise, in my opinion."

Former Bush-backers in blogosphere, like Winds of Change founder Joe Katzman, are none too pleased, either. The escalation option "has deep blind spots that destroy my confidence in [its] proposed solutio[n] as anything except a recipe for accelerated defeat," he concludes. Katzman's got a long, detailed list of the surge effort's unanswered questions. A few:

* If capturing terrorists in Iraq continues to result in "catch and release" due to a poorly-functioning and often intimidated Iraqi judicial system, what do you expect to accomplish with more troops? A higher flow-through rate?

* What are the fundamental attitudes on the ground of Sunni and Shi'ite leaders? Are the Sunnis really prepared to deal, or are they still maniacally focused on their loss of dominance in Iraq?

* If you stupidly continue to let Moqtada "death squads" al-Sadr live, what lasting good do 50,000 troops do when you propose to deploy them for a while in Baghdad? US troops have whittled down his forces before - how do the long-term results look now? What happens after US troops leave, if al-Sadr is still breathing?