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Entry: The Surge--Is It Soup Yet? Link: http://www.takimag.com/site/article/the_surge_is_it_soup_yet#21170 Post contents: I find it interesting that many people are now saying that "things are going better in Iraq," or that now "we're winning." I don't remember these people saying Iraq was worsening in 2006 or that "things were going bad." Defenders of the Bush Administration always say things are going great in Iraq and that victory is just around the corner -- if we just stick it out. If violence didn't wane in mid-2006 I'm sure most of the apologists for this Administration would be saying that things are going great in Iraq. Of course this raises a more important question: what does it mean to say the "surge" is working? If "working" simply means reducing the amount of violence, then, yes, the "surge" is working, but does this mean that we are now able to withdrawal from Iraq? It doesn't seem so. John McCain still says we may need to stay in Iraq for 100 hundred years. So the real issue is what social, political, and economic conditions must prevail in Iraq before we can leave? The defenders of the war in Iraq never get specific enough to let us know. If violence stays at this level for a year can we leave? Or must it drop further? Must it drop another 50%? 60? 95%? What? Violence has dropped but we are no closer to withdrawing from Iraq than we were in 2006. By the only account that matters, the surge is a failure. Sent at: 2008 05 13