2 + 2 = Iraq is lost.

SusanUnPC at No Quarter:

Here's some simple arithmetic: "Our son Jeff is a Captain in the Air Force. He is about to start his fourth rotation in Iraq." (Read his parents' story.)

Now here's Paul Krugman's "The Arithmetic of Failure," in today's New York Times:

Iraq is a lost cause. It’s just a matter of arithmetic: given the violence of the environment, with ethnic groups and rival militias at each other’s throats, American forces there are large enough to suffer terrible losses, but far too small to stabilize the country.

We’re so undermanned that we’re even losing our ability to influence events: earlier this week, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki brusquely rejected American efforts to set a timetable for reining in the militias.

[...]

It’s hard to believe that the world’s only superpower is on the verge of losing not just one but two wars. But the arithmetic of stability operations suggests that unless we give up our futile efforts in Iraq, we’re on track to do just that.

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