Looping the Hen

A 30 to 1 Kill Ratio 'Raises Doubts'

I have been unusually non-political lately, spending more time concentrating on poker, Civ 4 and work than on Iraq, climate change and talking heads.

Still, I found this account of what sounds like a huge victory in Iraq a little one-sided. In the first paragraph the author presents his lede:

Accounts of the bloody battle near Najaf have produced more questions than answers, raising doubts about Iraqi security forces' performance and concern over tensions within the majority Shiite community.

Okay, so my doubts about the Iraqi security forces are supposed to be raised. However, later on in the story, we find that with US and British help, they captured 650 enemy combatants, and killed 300. The Iraqi security forces lost only 11, 30 wounded, and there were 2 Americans dead when their helicopter was shot down.

So, let me try and understand this. The good guys kill the bad guys at a 30 to 1 ratio, and disable them on a 100 to 1 ratio, and we are supposed to have our doubts raised? How about this as a more accurate title: 'With US support, Iraqi Security forces devastate terrorist militia' or 'Enemy militia has worse odds than longshot in Kentucky Derby.'

Is it possible the Iraqi's let the group assemble so they could all be killed or caught in one fell swoop, as it sounds like happened? It is possible that intelligence agents had this on their radar for awhile, and the media was just not informed. Who knows. All I can say to the folks, Iraqi, American and British, who participated in this battle is that you kick serious Soldier of Heaven buttocks.

I'm not sure what the reporter expected. With near a thousand enemy combatants, this was a battle larger than many in history, and should be expected to take more than a few resources, and time. The fact that the good guys came out of it with (relatively) few losses is good news and should be a source of pride for our armed forces and those Iraqis they trained.