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Petraeus: "Astonishing Signs of Normalcy"?

General David Petraeus, commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, is the man everyone's watching. Petraeus has a deserved reputation for clarity and honesty, something I've observed firsthand on two occasions I've had to interview him. His status assessment on the surge, slated to be delivered to congress in September, will be a political milestone for how Washington views the war, and so there's no shortage of speculation about what message Petraeus will deliver. If it's anything like his interviewwith USA Today, though, expect his briefing to accentuate the positive.

On a day when the bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra threatened to reignite sectarian chaos, Petraeus gave a curious description of Baghdad to the paper:

If you drive around Baghdad, you'll find astonishing signs of normalcy in perhaps half to two-thirds of the city. … In fact, the car bomb numbers have come down fairly steadily as well until just a couple of days ago, and we'll see if we can get those coming down again. …

There's a real vibrancy in certain parts of Iraq, and in others obviously there is continued fighting and a sectarian cycle of violence underway. Obviously, there is damage, a need to … help them stitch back the fabric of society that was torn during the height of the sectarian violence.

When I was in Baghdad in March, I saw normalcy myself, but I also saw a police force infiltrated with Shiite militias and a city teeming with tension. His interview came right as Baghdad instituted a total vehicular curfew, a number of Sunni mosques were bombedin retaliation for Samarra, and Iraq waits to see how bad the fallout from the attack will be. If that wasn't enough, the Pentagon's latest quarterly report on Iraq shows no decrease in violence, despite the arrival of Petraeus as commander and a 30,000-troop reinforcement. Suggesting that the "vibrancy" of certain parts of Iraq is as significant as this larger picture risks diminishing Petraeus's hard-won credibility for the first time in his career.


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Take it from someone who spent his first eighteen years as an Army brat; the first word in "career military" is always "career" . . .

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Wow, the million$ of dollar$ I would make if there was a website somewhere where I could bet on whether or not The General will give an honest view, or a ridiculously rosy, upbeat view.

The odds on "rosy" would have to be 1-1,000,000 at least.

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Redefining normal again, I see.

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Petraeus... when will we learn... doesn't anybody remember he's the clown sent over to Iraq to train the Iraqi replacement army.. and failed so miserably? You wanna believe anything that jerk says?

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they're back to a normal level of car bombings and kidnap-torture-murders. must be nice for them. the food markets and mosques blow up just once a week, 'stead of twice. bearpaw beat me to it: 'defining normalcy down.'

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I guess blowing up mosques and open civil war is becoming "astonishingly normal" alright! The "rosey scenario" is getting so old it's really starting to stink. When do we get some "reality based community" people in command?

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And the band played on.

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Oh, come on…this is like the abused wife who thinks things are better because her husband is only beating her every other day with the stick – the other days he’s still using his fists.

I suppose if you’re the guy who wrote the filed manual on counter-insurgency, you have a desire to implement your theories in a real situation. And I guess if you wrote the book, you have a vested interest in succeeding, which means you are more likely to see success when it isn’t there.

Petraeus’ inherent conflict of interest means that he should not be the one who assesses whether this surge is working.

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And the band played on.

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You know, there is civil/sectarian unrest throughout the region now. It's all the rage!! Everyone wants in on it. Why look at Gaza, Lebanon...

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It's astonishingly normal for military leaders to lie through their teeth.

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when are you all going to report on von spakovsky's appearance before a senate committee yesterday.

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"If you drive around Baghdad, you'll find astonishing signs of normalcy in perhaps half to two-thirds of the city. … In fact, the car bomb numbers have come down fairly steadily as well until just a couple of days ago, and we'll see if we can get those coming down again. …"

Reverse-Orwell transcription:

"Recently I went on an inspection of Baghdad, wearing a helmet and bulletproof vest, surrounded by over one hundred soldiers, six Bradleys and ten Blackhawks. In precisely one-quarter of the city I saw occasional indications that not all Iraqis were living like prisoners in their own homes: I saw a man dumping feces into the street, a vender hawking car parts (some of which appeared oddly twisted and soot-covered), and a ten-year old girl in a miniskirt holding up a sign written in red lipstick - although it was in Arabic that I could not read.... Car bombings dropped from 93 per month to 92 per month during the last week of May, although they rose to 30 per week during the first two weeks of June. I told my officer who keeps track of the statistics to see if any of those cars might have actually have exploded due to faulty ignition wiring or other problems relating to poor maintenance."

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Reminds me of Westmoreland.

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how many rugs and pairs of sunglasses has the general purchased....

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"Obviously, there is damage, a need to … help them stitch back the fabric of society that was torn during the height of the sectarian violence."

Guess he's saying the worse is over? Amazing.

code = public as in government is a game to which the public is not invited.

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Lie down with dogs, get up with fleas.

As anyone could have predicted, the first casualty of Petraeus' association with Bush and Cheney is his integrity.

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Looks like the pod people got him. I think Lieberman carried it over on his last trip to Iraq.

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Petraeus: Mouth open,

Kool Aid: In

Repeat.

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Commenter Anne got it right. Conflict of interest. He wrote the book. If he can't control the insurgency using the strategies he outlined, that doesn't look so good, does it.

Wanna bet that's one of the reasons he got the job? He's in the same bed with Bush. There is no Plan B.

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How closely does General Petraeus follow his own guidelines with regard to counter-insurgency and occupation? I'm fairly certain the troop levels don't. Any ideas?

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Petraeus wrote an army field manual: How closely does General Petraeus follow his own guidelines with regard to counter-insurgency and occupation? I'm fairly certain the troop levels don't. Any ideas?

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Counter insurgency isn't going to work in Iraq: this is something different, a civil war.

The error isn't just the failed US response, but when it adjusted, still applying the wrong model.

Two wrongs don't fix Iraq.

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If he can't control the insurgency using the strategies he outlined, that doesn't look so good, does it.

IIRC, petreus's strategy would require 650K US troops. he's using the bush strategy instead, which i'm sure he sees as equal or superior to his own.

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If he can't control the insurgency using the strategies he outlined, that doesn't look so good, does it.

IIRC, petreus's strategy would require 650K US troops. he's using the bush strategy instead, which i'm sure he sees as equal or superior to his own.

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"Petraeus has a deserved reputation for clarity and honesty, something I've observed firsthand on two occasions I've had to interview him."

May I suggest your powers of observation are insufficient to the task at hand.

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Petraeus (betrayus) is right; it is astonishing because it is unlikely to be the truth.

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This is a classic case of lying without actually lying. We know there are "signs of normalcy" in Baghdad: water runs downhill, the sun is in the sky in the daytime, moon at night, etc. But as today's Pentagon report shows, there are also astonishing signs that the violence hasn't decreased even slightly--only moved to places where there are less troops.

Patraeus is a liar. A damn good one too.

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This is a classic case of lying without actually lying. We know there are "signs of normalcy" in Baghdad: water runs downhill, the sun is in the sky in the daytime, moon at night, etc. But as today's Pentagon report shows, there are also astonishing signs that the violence hasn't decreased even slightly--only moved to places where there are less troops.

Patraeus is a liar. A damn good one too.

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big-time general lies like a rug. he too has a reserved seat on the rocket ship "new world" when it blasts out in 4 years as oil runs out...

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so if the "clear and honest" general drives around bagdad, he sees "astonishing signs of normalcy" in "perhaps half to two-thirds of the city"

so?

let's have some clear and honest talk about the military effort!

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"Petraeus has a deserved reputation for clarity and honesty, something I've observed firsthand on two occasions I've had to interview him."

OK Spencer, I get the same vibe too, but Bush has put him in a position totally inappropriate for any U.S. military commander. U.S. Generals don't start wars, and they sure as hell shouldn't decide when to stop them. Bush, lacking any credibility of his own, has framed this as "let the general, not the politicians, make the decisions".

Petraeus will honestly report a mixed bag of facts, understandably emphasizing what our soldiers have accomplished.

Then we will see if the Rep. strategy of delay has worked, and if the American People have become so desensitized to American deaths as to let them continue through the end of Bush's Presidency.

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When George W Bush walks downtown Baghdad hand in hand with Laura and isn't shot dead I'll say Iraq is a success. Until then if it looks like a duck and smells like a duck and walks like a duck Iraq is a total failure.

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How about when Little Georgie and Laura can walk hand-in-hand through a major American city, without their secret service army, and not get shot dead? Would that be normal or abnormal? These things are just so confusing. I think we should arm the ducks.

They might be moving to Albania in 2009, just to feel safe and warm.

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Any time Petraeus wants to drive a car around Baghdad without half a division to guard his ass, then he'll find out what's "normal" in Iraq.

I recommend a big, black limousine. Oh, and just to make sure, put a little American flag on the antenna.

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Where's the video? I'll believe it when I see it with my own eyes.

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If things are going that well in Iraq, then why the need for the "surge", General. You sound like Joe Lie-berman and John McLame when they went to the market with only 100 members of the military to protect them. Since we have virtually no press in Iraq then we have no way of knowing when the general is lying to us AGAIN.

Oh yes, if it's that safe then President and Mrs. "smokey" Bush need to go for a stroll around Baghdad WITHOUT A 100 TROOPS TO ESCORT THEM. THen and only then will I feel like I am being told the truth.

And general, I guess you have given up your military escort as well. Yea, right.

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Petraeus did write the book on counter-insurgency and had "success" (see Fiasco) but was undermined by the LACK OF ENOUGH TROOPS!! and the constant rotation of units that had finally established a relationship with the locals. Once again we are playing Whack a Mole!
I am disappointed that he has not stated the need for many more troops over and beyond the Surge to achieve any kind of meaningful security. If only one senior commander on the field had said this early on we may not be in this complete mess

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Petraeus did write the book on counter-insurgency and had "success" (see Fiasco) but was undermined by the LACK OF ENOUGH TROOPS!! and the constant rotation of units that had finally established a relationship with the locals. Once again we are playing Whack a Mole!
I am disappointed that he has not stated the need for many more troops over and beyond the Surge to achieve any kind of meaningful security. If only one senior commander on the field had said this early on we may not be in this complete mess

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heatless and gutless military whore, better known as the great general patreus. to say what he said today, just shows that these human scum will sacrifice anything and anybody for their greedy political and finacial gain. it seems like this guy is in some other realm of reality where he attends his church and prays to his god and belives that what he is doing is good. these piss stains are not dumb! they know exacatly what they want to accomplish. work the dark side .

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