What if the War is Worse?

Think about it for a moment. What if the war is even worse than the critics like us think?

The concept of leaderless resistence is well known to those who pay attention to modern warfare, extremism, and terrorism. The issue of networked warfare has been addressed by numerous researchers and commentators, its just that the Jihadist Evangelical Far Right RepubliChritian's in charge of our country (Heaven help us indeed) just aren't listening. As this OP ED in today's New York Times makes clear these problems are worse than most of the media are reporting (big surprise, right?). But... what if its even worse than that?

Also check out a follow-up at the author's website.

IN September, the Defense Department floated a solicitation for a company to build a "system of metrics to accurately assess U.S. progress in the war on terrorism" and make suggestions on how to improve the effort. As a software executive and former Air Force counterterrorist operative, I began thinking: how would I build this system and what would I recommend?

My first task would be to gauge our progress in Iraq. It is now, for better or worse, the epicenter of the war on terrorism. By most measurements, the war is going badly.

Insurgent attacks have been increasing steadily since the invasion, and the insurgents' methods are growing more sophisticated. American casualty rates remain high despite an increasingly experienced force and improvements in armor. The insurgents have also radically expanded their campaign of violence to include Iraqi troops, police officers, government officials and Shiite civilians. Since the American military's objective is to gain a monopoly on violence in Iraq, these developments indicate that it has sustained the commercial equivalent of a rapid loss in market share.

Despite this setback, the military and the Bush administration continue to claim progress, though this progress appears to be measured in the familiar metric of body counts. According to the military, it kills or captures 1,000 to 3,000 insurgents a month. Its estimate of the insurgency, however, is a mere 12,000 to 20,000 fighters. Something is clearly wrong. Simple math indicates we have destroyed the insurgency several times over since it started.

Perhaps Iraq's insurgency is much larger than the Defense Department has reported. Other observers estimate that up to 20 percent of the two million former Baathists may be involved in the insurgency. This estimate would partly explain the insurgency's ability to withstand high losses while increasing its market share of violence.

The other likely explanation is one the military itself makes: that the insurgency isn't a fragile hierarchical organization but rather a resilient network made up of small, autonomous groups. This means that the insurgency is virtually immune to attrition and decapitation. It will combine and recombine to form a viable network despite high rates of attrition. Body counts - and the military should already know this - aren't a good predictor of success.

Worse, right?