interesting, in light of rumsfeld's resignation and charlie rangel's call for the draft, and the go long/big/home debate. http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=111706A [rquoter] The Human Calculus of National Security By Philip R. O'Connor PH.D : 20 Nov 2006 Following the Democratic mid-term triumph, California U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer told National Public Radio that the recent average daily loss of three military people in Iraq necessitated disengagement as soon as possible. Sen. Boxer has posed a fundamental question: What price in American lives are we prepared to pay for our national security policies? There is a cold-blooded calculus at the heart of decisions that must be taken by the leaders we choose. No one likes to talk about it but it's the elephant in the room. Let's stipulate that every life is precious and every one of us cringes when we switch on the TV and hear casualty reports. Let's also stipulate, however, that we expect our elected leaders to make life and death decisions mindful of the interests of the broader society and of generations to come. Any leader disposed toward treating these decisions in exclusively personal terms is unfit for leadership. But what happens if our leaders have no referent for the human calculus of preserving the nation's security? Suppose they have no idea or refuse to even consider the price they are willing for us to pay for our security. We recognize the inevitability of deaths in our police and fire services and among our utility and sanitation workers. As a society we know that, taken together, these four professions alone have an average daily duty-related death rate of about one per day. But we also appreciate the absolute importance of those jobs for our daily well being. Let's look at the record on precisely the terms Senator Boxer suggests, the daily average rate of military fatalities. As in any analytical exercise, we must simplify as well as recognize that over the years our casualty reporting systems have become much more precise. We also need to realize that the lethality of warfare is not measured solely in those who perish but also in terms of the injuries suffered. Over time, the ratio of wounded to dying has risen significantly, from about 1.7 to 1 in both World Wars, to 3 to 1 in Vietnam and about 7or 8 to 1 in the current operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. We also must put aside the average daily death rate in the military since the post-Cold War downsizing began of about between two and three per day from training and auto accidents, disease and so forth. Let's look then only at military fatalities from all causes during our major wars and consider those wars as part of long term national security policy strategies. And we will not treat the losses suffered by our many and varied allies over the years, including those in the current conflict. Further, the Confederate dead of our Civil War must be included. Lincoln himself would have wanted it thus. In the full sweep of U.S history, from the commencement of the Revolution on Lexington Green in April 1775, until the sunny morning of September 11, 2001, our average daily sacrifice has been between 14 and 15 military fatalities (1,217,000 fatalities/83,461 days = 14.6/day). Since 9/11, the average daily sacrifice has been 1.7 per day (3200/1900=1.68). From the Revolutionary War until the American entry into World War I, the average daily rate was about 11 per day (578,000/52,231=11.07). From World War I through the break up of the Soviet Union, the rate was over 16 per day (636,000/38,811=16.39). Or in our long running confrontation with Soviet communism following World War II until the collapse of the Soviet empire, the rate was over between 6 and 7 per day (112,400/16,892=6.65). As things stand, the conflict with Islamic radicalism involves the lowest average daily military fatality rate of any long run national security era. It may worsen, it may improve. If Congress had been asked on September 12, 2001, to endorse a national defense posture against Islamic radicalism that traded up to 2 military fatalities per day over the subsequent five years in return for no additional homeland attacks, the deposing of terror friendly regimes in Afghanistan and Iraq, the ending of Libya's nuclear program, what would they have done? Would Congress accept that bargain today? In making the national defense calculus our leaders cannot ignore parts of history they don't like and choose just the parts they want in order to pretend that national security can be achieved at little or no human cost over the long haul. We can no more remove Vietnam or Korea from the Cold War calculus than we can the Italian campaign or the re-taking of the Philippines from the World War II calculus. Those costly campaigns, seen by as some as inconclusive, misdirected or unwarranted, are part and parcel of ultimately winning strategies. Decisive engagements usually come only after many indecisive ones. If we choose to resist Islamic radicalism and to help others, especially in the Islamic world, to resist and defeat it, and if we believe that freedom and democracy at home and abroad will certainly demand military force - then what daily military fatality rate are we willing to accept as a matter of policy? Philip R. O'Connor is a writer in Chicago and holds a doctorate in political science from Northwestern University.[/rquoter]
Ugh. I am really beginning to hate these arguments. Iraq is not the American Revolution or the Civil War and it is not WWI or WWII or even the Cold War. Comparing casualty rates is about as absurd and cynical as you can get. Iraq is a strategic blunder of monumental proportions that does nothing to further advance the national interest... in fact it damages the national interest. Furthermore, the bolded section only puts the parts of the equation that are the most favorable for the author's twisted argument and even then in the most simplistic terms available. There are many other parts to the equation that are not mentioned and the fact that the author won't address them is reason enough to consign this piece of propaganda to the circular file. For if he did address the whole equation, his piece would be one that naturally led the readers to a position similar to Boxer's when the intent is not to examine the facts, but to lead the reader away from the position taken by Boxer.
for bush supporters, it is ok to compare iraq to any and every war except vietnam. they are really weird like that.
Wow, I'm pretty sure congress wouldn't accept such a bleakly worded bargain that treats lives as fungible. But anyway, if that is what the writer thinks that that the cost and effect of the Administrations strategy has been.....he needs to get back to reality, because he is not even close to being close to being close to being close.
what makes the writer an expert on national security? http://www.delphifin.com/company/bio_oconnor.html
Dude he's a bean counter and making a depressingly stupid argument which belies this - though it does showcase impressive arithmetic powers of long division; I would not be surprised if his PhD concentrated on the quantitative analysis part. Regardless, this piece is crap, no wonder it's just some random blog posting.
Yes, I posted exactly why in my previous post. The fact that he intentionally avoids assessing the true cost of war by only lives lost (and only american ones at that) is fundamentally and intellectually dishonest, as are a number of his other assumptions which are faked on both sides of the equation. It doesn't take a genius to realize this. it's actually quite typical that he makes the classic, bean counters mistake of taking into account a number while failing to appreciate the true economic cost.
If you want to count beans, how about talking about the trillion dollars the war in Iraq will end up costing us. We're at 600 billion now, that doesn't count replacing equipment after four years of war or count the future medical costs of the thousands of seriously wounded soldier. That trillion dollars could be better used elsewhere... Port security maybe? Though the utopian of democracy in the middle east sounded good. Say.... isn't Lebanon a democracy? I guess it takes two beacons of democracy to make a difference.
Curious that the author doesn't include THESE casualties in his disgusting equation. But since basso is such a Phillip O'Connor-phile perhaps he can clue us in as to the going rate. How many soldiers a day would you leave armless, legless or sightless, basso?
This has to be the dumbest arguement ever. No amount of casualties are exceptable to me in an unwinnable war, which was unwinnable from day one. The only way there will ever be peace in the Middle East is genocide. Is America ready for genocide? I think we have achieved are goal of bringing freedom to Iraq. The Iraqi's are freely killing U.S. soldiers and each other.
Let's see... 671,000 wounded in WWII/48 months = about 14,000 wounded per month. Divide that by 30 and you get about 466 individuals wounded each day. What with WWII and Iraq being at least equal in their noble cause... OK, Iraq is more important because the current President is a Republican... the US should be able to sustain about 500 injuries per day to win in Iraq and bring Democracy to the ME and get rid of Saddam and to destroy WMDs and to prevent torture and rape and to keep the terrorists fighting us there instead of following us home. So, I would suspect basso might answer "about 500" per day because he is prepared to do what is necessary. Then again, maybe I'm wrong.
i'm a do what's necessary kind of guy, but that's easy for me since i'm a pushing 50 mouse jockey. however, i continue to believ the war is a noble one, and one that has direct consequences for US security. my arguement from the beginning has been we should be more ruthless. not necesarrily greater troops, but we should have taken out sadr and his army when they first raised their turbanned heads. we should have shot looters. and we should have flattened flattened fallujah ala Hama. there'd be a lot less resistance now if we had.
The Sacking of Louvain is the classic example of why you are misjudging the situation. I am trying not to be inflamitory in my response here, but if you take a look at that situation you will see that such responses only draw into the fight people who would otherwise not be involved.
To do what Basso suggested, meant the U.S. would have to be prepared to do that kind of destruction and ruthlessness to the entire Middle East.
actually, dresden was more the model i had in mind. unless you're comparing the germans of 1914 to the us of 2003. not being inflamatory, just asking for clarification.
