Posted on 04/08/2008 5:39:08 AM PDT by LSUfan
Data from the Defense Intelligence Agency indicates that enemy-initiated attacks on U.S. troops, Iraqi security forces and Iraqi civilians peaked in October 2006, the month leading up to the U.S. midterm elections.
At the time, Vice President Dick Cheney said the insurgents were "very sensitive to the fact that we've got an election scheduled" and were trying to "break the will of the American people." Democrats, who cast the 2006 midterm election as a referendum on Iraq, ended up taking control of both the House and the Senate.
The DIA data shows that between November 2006 and May 2007, attacks remained at the highest levels of the five-year conflict. Since last summer, however, when the surge in U.S. forces in Iraq reached full strength, attacks have precipitously declined, dropping almost 70 percent between June 2007 and January 2008.
The DIA-reported data was published in a bar graph printed by the Government Accountability Office in written testimony presented to the Senate Appropriations Committee on March 11.
The testimony by Comptroller General David Walker was titled, "Stabilizing and Rebuilding Iraq: Actions Needed to Address Inadequate Accountability over U.S. Efforts and Investment."
The graph of DIA data, printed on page 5 of the testimony, shows a vertical bar representing the total number of enemy-initiated attacks in each month of the war. Each bar is divided into color-coded sections (white, gray and dark grey) to illustrate the relative number of attacks against Iraqi security forces, Iraqi civilians and U.S. troops.
The graph shows that the overall number of enemy-initiated attacks during the entire course of the war peaked in October 2006 at more than 5,000. It also shows that the number of enemy-initiated attacks see-sawed for the next seven months, but never again reached the level recorded in the month before the U.S. midterm elections.
Overall attacks declined in November 2006, rose somewhat in December 2006, rose again in January 2007, dropped in February 2007, rose in March 2007, rose slightly again in April 2007, then rose some more in May 2007.
After May 2007, attacks declined in every month except December, which showed a slight increase from November.
The GAO testimony does not comment on the data indicating that enemy-initiated attacks peaked in October 2006, just before the U.S. election; instead, the testimony focuses on the steady decline in attacks after June 2007.
"As shown in figure 1 [the bar graph based on DIA data], the security situation generally deteriorated through the summer of 2007, with the number of attacks increasing to about 180 per day in June 2007," Walker testified.
"However, since then," he said, "the number of enemy-initiated attacks has decreased by about two-thirds, to the levels of early 2005. Specifically, the average number of daily attacks decreased from about 180 in June 2007 to about 60 in January 2008-a nearly 70 percent decrease-as the number of attacks against coalition forces in particular fell considerably. The number of attacks on Iraqi security forces and civilians also declined from June 2007 levels. While security has improved in Iraq, a permissive security environment has yet to be achieved."
Read about a soldier wounded in these attacks? Thank a Copperhead Democrat.
They put party loyalty before loyalty to country.
Now they want loyalty oaths to the DNC at the polling centers.
These traitors make me puke.
Who would bin Laden vote for in November? That’s the only question Americans need to ask going forward.
Are they really talking about party loyalty oaths?
I agree. You would think people would get wise to an obvious tactic!
too bad no one has the balls to tell the truth about the Democratic party’s conduct in the past 5 years. As a group, they are traitorous and deserve public contempt. Instead, due to the silence on the right, they are winning the debate.
I asked that question at a dinner party in NJ a few weeks ago, as I was surrounded by libs. I got this reply from a 50-something woman: "I don't know about bin Laden, but I could never vote for McCain. He doesn't believe that a woman's body belongs to her, and he wants to take away her right to choooooooooose."
There are plenty of reasons not to vote for McCain, but that ain't one of them.
Republicans should have used this as an issue to hammer the Dems in ‘06 but were too timid, or at least that’s how it looked to me. Maybe in individual races it was a different story but I followed the campaign closely on FR and wondered why they weren’t trying to show how the Dems are practically in bed with the bad guys. It might not have saved the majority but it could have brought out a few more Repubs in close races.
The fact that the evil doers want the Dems to win makes this year’s race all the more scary. And that the Dems are so heavily favored to gain more seats in Congress, and probably take the presidency, shows how naive the American people appear to be.
Just the terrorist way to support the democrat party!
BUMP
Of course, our enemies try (somewhat successfully) to influence our elections according to their benefit. They did so in Spain with good results and other Western nations as well. Our politicians and media never note the outside influence. And not just with violence, look at the Clinton fortunes emanating from Chine and Indonesia.
Alqaida needs to be careful about this tactic because it would likely result in massive Democrat wins in Congress if not the White House, and those people panic easy and respond to attacks with Declaration of War and nukes, etc. because they aren’t real warriors and men of war so next attack could produce most unfortunate results from Alqaida’s point of view.
Huh?
If you don't see things their way and submit gracefully, the big copy might give you a dislocated shoulder; in the same situation, the petite police-chick might put three or four 10-mm hole punches right through your recently consumed supper.
The difference between the policewoman and the liberals is that the liberals don't feel personally threatened by Al-Qaeda, so, they don't act with the same resolution. They are likely to "draw" prematurely in order to show that they aren't really spineless, but all that accomplishes is to escalate the situation. When, not if, their natural timidity regains its place on top of the heap of their roiling emotions, they back down prematurely (actually, they force the agents with the guns, the ones actually in danger from the enemy, to do it), and once again a liberal disaster is born. Of course, as usual, the wrong people get blamed for it as well.
Meh.
Democrap leadership poo pooed the idea that the terrorists are supporting Democrat victories in our national elections.
Those children are not “parasites” who practically “raped” the woman against her will. She willing became a host to them and is trying to shirk her natural responsibility to them.
Yes. Look at the hub bub in these late season primary races where Republicans are crossing over just as the Democrats did early on saddling us with debates featuring Ron Paul and John McCain.
Shouldn’t there be more debates by the way since the Democrats still haven’t distinguished their candidates?
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