"The Iraq Index is a statistical compilation of economic, public opinion, and security data. This resource will provide updated information on various criteria, including crime, telephone and water service, troop fatalities, unemployment, Iraqi security forces, oil production, and coalition troop strength. The index is designed to quantify the rebuilding efforts and offer an objective set of criteria for benchmarking performance. It is the first in-depth, non-partisan assessment of American efforts in Iraq, and is based primarily on U.S. government information."
Monday, May 21, 2007
Quantifying Progress in Iraq
Everyone knows how much I love quantification. So how do we know if there is progress in Iraq? The Brookings Institute (which is supposed to be bipartisan or right leaning) seems have come up with a novel way to do so.
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2 comments:
That would only work if they divided the entire country into tiny little sectors. In Baghdad this would have to be a neighborhood by neighborhood type of ordeal. I don’t think that they would find anything that is already unknown; central Iraq is most problematic and the least progress has been made there in terms of security etc. The only measure of “success” is the Iraqi forces being able to organize, run, and maintain operations in the country as our troops do now. That’s the que to get the hell out.
After Gen. Petraeus has adequate time to “maintain” the current plan we should start reducing our footprint and start filling in the gaps unit by unit with Iraqi forces. More than likely we will be pulling out of Iraq in the beginning of the next presidency; the Iraqis have to understand that.
It looks like a very thorough report (every month).
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