[Dean's World] Dave Price: Conversation With Commissar

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Posted by Dave Price:
Conversation With Commissar
http://www.deanesmay.com/posts/1159282128.shtml


   In the comments to [1]this post, Politburo Diktat's Commissar asks of
   me a question that really goes to the heart of the Iraq debate.
   I assume youâre familiar with the concept of âfalsifiability,â as a
   test of distinguishing between a belief and an observable fact.
   Hereâs a statement: âBush and Rumsfeld have done a great job managing
   the war in Iraq (or, if flawed, better than any conceivable
   alternative).â
   Is there anything you could read or observe that would falsify that
   statement for you? If you read âXâ might that cause you to re-think
   the truth of that statement? For you, is there any âXâ that might
   cause such a re-evaluation?
   Well, I wouldn't go so far as "any conceivable alternative," but of
   course there are numerous scenarios that would falsify even a weak
   statement of the war being prosecuted reasonably well (which is about
   where I stand): if we had failed to remove Saddam from power, if we
   had not established a constitutional democratic government, if there
   were not 300,000 ISF trained and taking over the fight, if the
   insurgency had widespread popular support, if there were massive U.S.
   casualties, if there was a massive Iraqi humanitarian crisis due to
   lack of food/water/sanitation (as most wars have seen)... I could go
   on. There is a virtually limitless number of ways that statement could
   be easily falsified -- but I wonder if there is any way it could ever
   ring true in some ears.
   The problem with debating war is that, as Commissar correctly
   ascertains, it is such a large and fluid situation that anyone can
   find support for their position somewhere. The way around that,
   though, is easy: ask what our major goals were going in, and then ask
   whether we accomplished them, and compare the results to previous,
   similar efforts.
   When you employ empirical methods, rather than holding the war
   prosecutors to impossible Platonic ideals or what some pundits think
   "shoulda coulda woulda" been done with 20/20 hindsight, the debate
   over "success" to this point becomes rather one-sided.
   Of course, one should also set future conditions for falsifiablity:
   certainly one reminaing major goal is that at some point, most U.S.
   forces should be able to come home. This is likely to happen by 2008,
   but could take longer depending on circumstances which are not
   necessarily in our control, such as the willingness of Sunni Arab
   militants to give up the fight.
   I think that last point deserves some elucidation, because it is
   central to the claims of failure, which seem to rest on the
   proposition that the counterinsurgency should be over by now. Some
   wars end with a tidy surrender ceremony on the deck of a battleship;
   Saddam's regime could not have executed such a manuever even if they
   wanted to, because of the nature of their regime was such that much of
   the population would have fought them the minute it was clear the
   regime was not able to crush such an uprising (remember, this regime
   carried out huge bloody civil wars to stay in power in the 1980s and
   1990s); the regime ruled almost exclusively by force of arms and
   terror and once those were largely taken away it no longer enjoyed any
   semblance of ruling the country (unlike, say, postwar Japan). A
   violent enemy that does not surrender and has some level of support
   from even a small area of the population is extremely difficult to
   root out (just ask the Russians; Chechnya is still giving them
   problems).
   My guess is we'll need something on the order of 500,000 ISF to take
   up the thankless task of opposing those trying to murder their way
   back into power by overthrowing the elected Iraqi government, should
   they continue to fight. As long as measurable progress toward that
   goal continues (more ISF, more training, more equipment, more
   provinces under their control) at a reasonable pace I find it hard to
   fault the efforts thus far.

References

   1. http://acepilots.com/mt/2006/09/25/rumsfeld-is-at-war-with-the-us-army/