The "surge" increased troop levels to control sectarian violence. All of the talking heads have accepted the standard interpretation that "It worked." Obama has been criticized in the press for opposing the surge, but the basis for concluding that the surge worked was recently undermined by new study that analyzes satellite imagery of nighttime lights in Bagdad. The authors explain the methodology in the following way:
Our purpose is to assess the degree to which the overall nighttime light signature of the city and its distribution across neighborhoods have changed during the period of the surge. If the surge has truly `worked' we would expect to see a steady increase in nighttime light output over time, as electrical infrastructure is repaired and restored.
What did they find? The study argues argues that increased sectarian violence emptied Sunni Arab neighborhoods before the surge -- the lights in those neighborhoods went out. The authors interpret their own study to mean:
the outcome of the ethno - sectarian violence in Baghdad has perhaps been a more likely cause of the decline in nighttime lights than the military surge in itself.
This diary is short. My only purpose is to draw attention to the study that analyzes the "Surge." The study was well-written and it can be downloaded for free at the journal, "Environment and Planning," HERE. Please do yourself the favor and read it.
With the financial crisis and health care, I'm not sure the debate will ever come back to the war in Iraq, but if it ever does, we should all be armed with the newest information about the Surge. It has been blogged elsewhere, but I searched for it on dKos before writing this. Please help me out if I overlooked another diary on the topic.
The data and analysis are compelling. The authors conclusion go a bit further:
Our findings suggest that in these terms the surge has had no observable effect, except insofar as it has helped to provide a seal of approval for a process of ethno-sectarian neighborhood homogenization that is now largely achieved but with a tremendous decline in the extent of residential intermixing between groups and a probable significant loss of population in some areas.
Whether or not you agree with the "seal of approval" bit, the surge took place after the neighborhoods cleared. No media pundit should be allowed to claim that "the surge worked," without being challenged.