Did "the Surge" really fail?

Did the surge save Iraq? A lot of security and foreign policy experts have attempted to answer that question -- and they provide an assortment of answers.

A unique team of scholars from UCLA has published their latest research that directly challenges the standard political narrative about the effectiveness of "the surge" in Iraq:

By tracking the amount of light emitted by Baghdad neighborhoods at night, a team of UCLA geographers has uncovered fresh evidence that last year's U.S. troop surge in Iraq may not have been as effective at improving security as some U.S. officials have maintained.

Night light in neighborhoods populated primarily by embattled Sunni residents declined dramatically just before the February 2007 surge and never returned, suggesting that ethnic cleansing by rival Shiites may have been largely responsible for the decrease in violence for which the U.S. military has claimed credit, the team reports in a new study based on publicly available satellite imagery.

"Essentially, our interpretation is that violence has declined in Baghdad because of intercommunal violence that reached a climax as the surge was beginning," said lead author John Agnew, a UCLA professor of geography and authority on ethnic conflict. "By the launch of the surge, many of the targets of conflict had either been killed or fled the country, and they turned off the lights when they left."

Professor Agnew, the president of the American Association of Geographers, the leading professional organization in geography, specifically targets claims made by General Petraeus (and his supproters) about the efficacy of the military strategy:

"The surge really seems to have been a case of closing the stable door after the horse has bolted," Agnew said...

In addition to casting doubt on the efficacy of the surge in general, the study calls into question the success of a specific strategy of the surge, namely separating neighborhoods of rival sectarian groups by erecting concrete blast walls between them. The differences in light signatures had already started to appear by the time American troops began erecting the walls under General David Petraeus's direction, the researchers found.

"The U.S. military was sealing off neighborhoods that were no longer really active ribbons of violence, largely because the Shiites were victorious in killing large numbers of Sunnis or driving them out of the city all together," Agnew said. "The large portion of the refugees from Iraq who went during this period to Jordan and Syria are from these neighborhoods."

Incidentally, data presented last fall by the Independent Commission on the Security Forces of Iraq, headed by General James L. Jones, would seem to confirm the geographers' conclusions.

As I argued last year, the authors find that ethnic cleansing -- as well as internal displacement -- seems to explain the reduction in violence in Baghdad:

The night-light signature in four other large Iraqi cities — Kirkuk, Mosul, Tikrit and Karbala — held steady or increased between the spring of 2006 and the winter of 2007, the UCLA team found. None of these cities were targets of the surge.

Baghdad's decreases were centered in the southwestern Sunni strongholds of East and West Rashid, where the light signature dropped 57 percent and 80 percent, respectively, during the same period.

By contrast, the night-light signature in the notoriously impoverished, Shiite-dominated Sadr City remained constant, as it did in the American-dominated Green Zone. Light actually increased in Shiite-dominated New Baghdad, the researchers found.

Until just before the surge, the night-light signature of Baghdad had been steadily increasing overall, they report in "Baghdad Nights: Evaluating the U.S. Military 'Surge' Using Night Light Signatures."

"If the surge had truly 'worked,' we would expect to see a steady increase in night-light output over time, as electrical infrastructure continued to be repaired and restored, with little discrimination across neighborhoods," said co-author Thomas Gillespie, an associate professor of geography at UCLA. "Instead, we found that the night-light signature diminished in only in certain neighborhoods, and the pattern appears to be associated with ethno-sectarian violence and neighborhood ethnic cleansing."

Incidentally, the study authors apparently controlled for Baghdad's weak electrical power grid.


Hat tip: Mark Thoma.

Here's the academic citation for the Agnew article: Agnew J, Gillespie T W, Gonzalez J, Min B, 2008, "Baghdad nights: evaluating the US military ‘surge’ using nighttime light signatures" Environment and Planning A 40(10) 2285 – 2295


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Duck of Minerva posts

Today, at the Duck of Minerva I blogged about "2008 Grawemeyer winner" Philip Tetlock of the University of California, Berkeley. His book is about flawed expert political judgment -- and calls for public accountability for these analysts.

On November 28, I posted "Iraqi International Initiative" about the possible distribution of Iraqi oil revenues to refugees and displaced persons.

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New Orleans diaspora and International Norms

Under international law, the dispersed former citizens of New Orleans are now "internally displaced persons" (IDPs). Refugees, by contrast, are people who cross national borders when they flee their homes.

Readers may recall that the University of Louisville awarded its 2005 Grawemeyer Award for Ideas Improving World Order to Roberta Cohen and Francis Deng for their efforts to develop Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement. These principles

were presented to the UN Commission on Human Rights by the Representative [of the Secretary-General] in 1998.

The UN Commission and the General Assembly in unanimously adopted resolutions have taken note of the Principles, welcomed their use, and encouraged UN agencies, regional organizations, and NGOs to disseminate and apply them. Individual governments have begun to incorporate them in national policies and laws, international organizations and regional bodies have welcomed and endorsed them, and some national courts have begun to refer to them as relevant restatements of existing international law.

So what do these Guidelines say (also here) and how are they relevant to New Orleans? Here's one that caught my eye:

Principle 3

National authorities have the primary duty and responsibility to provide protection and humanitarian assistance to internally displaced persons within their jurisdiction.

Not to play the "blame game," but did you notice that it doesn't say "state and local"?

Several of the principles make clear that displacement should be a last resort and that even in the case of natural disaster, people should only be made to leave their homes when "the safety and health of those affected requires their evacuation" (Principle 6). Clearly, some homes in the area were not flooded and some might argue that total evacuation of the region was not necessary. Caveat: I do not know the condition of gas and power lines in those areas. I only know that there are residents quite reluctant to leave even now who do not feel threatened.

Principle 7 includes these provisions pertinent to natural disaster cases:

(b) Adequate measures shall be taken to guarantee to those to be displaced full information on the reasons and procedures for their displacement and, where applicable, on compensation and relocation;

(c) The free and informed consent of those to be displaced shall be sought;

(d) The authorities concerned shall endeavour to involve those affected, particularly women, in the planning and management of their relocation;

(f) The right to an effective remedy, including the review of such decisions by appropriate judicial authorities, shall be respected.

Principle 11 concerns the safety of the displaced:

1. Every human being has the right to dignity and physical, mental and moral integrity.

2. Internally displaced persons, whether or not their liberty has been restricted, shall be protected in particular against:

(a) Rape, mutilation, torture, cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, and other outrages upon personal dignity, such as acts of gender-specific violence, forced prostitution and any form of indecent assault

In addition to stories about rapes and other attacks in the temporary housing, there have been stories about locked doors and road blocks:

Principle 14

1. Every internally displaced person has the right to liberty of movement and freedom to choose his or her residence.

2. In particular, internally displaced persons have the right to move freely in and out of camps or other settlements.

Hmmm. What about the people relocated to the Superdome and Convention Center, as an interim measure? Principle 18:

1. All internally displaced persons have the right to an adequate standard of living.

2. At the minimum, regardless of the circumstances, and without discrimination, competent authorities shall provide internally displaced persons with and ensure safe access to:

(a) Essential food and potable water;

(b) Basic shelter and housing;

(c) Appropriate clothing; and

(d) Essential medical services and sanitation.

About that foreign help, even from Cuba. Principle 25:

1. The primary duty and responsibility for providing humanitarian assistance to internally displaced persons lies with national authorities.

2. International humanitarian organizations and other appropriate actors have the right to offer their services in support of the internally displaced. Such an offer shall not be regarded as an unfriendly act or an interference in a State's internal affairs and shall be considered in good faith. Consent thereto shall not be arbitrarily withheld, particularly when authorities concerned are unable or unwilling to provide the required humanitarian assistance.

3. All authorities concerned shall grant and facilitate the free passage of humanitarian assistance and grant persons engaged in the provision of such assistance rapid and unimpeded access to the internally displaced.

I've merely highlighted some of the key concerns that I have had in the past week or so, but if you read the entire document, you will likely have others.

Former Clinton-era budget official for national security affairs, Gordon Adams, raises some of these issues, without the international normative angle, and draws a rather strong conclusion.

Helping Internally Displaced Peoples

Today, the University of Louisville announced the 2005 winner of the $200,000 Grawemeyer Award for Ideas Improving World Order.

James Carroll, a writer for the local Courier-Journal newspaper wrote a fine article about the winners and their ideas for helping "internally displaced peoples."

Francis Deng, a former U.N. special representative and a former Sudanese foreign minister, and Roberta Cohen, a senior fellow of foreign policy studies at the Brookings Institution, developed global standards for aiding as many as 30 million people displaced by civil war or natural disaster.

The Chronicle of Higher Education has an article too, if you have a subscription.

Note that internally displaced persons are not refugees. Indeed, because the latter are granted certain protections under international law, the former often face far greater hardships in their lives. Bluntly, many are displaced as a result of the policies made by the very same governments that they would depend upon for any relief.

Sovereignty is a major barrier to international efforts to provide assistance.

Deng and Cohen have argued for a "responsibility to protect" these internally displaced persons and their work has been quite influential over the past decade. Recent attention given to the crisis in the Sudan, for example, partly reflects the success of their project. Their work has helped create new global understandings about the need to resettle and reintegrate the displaced. Here's what Deng had to say when questioned about his work in specific states:

"Look, I come here recognizing this is an internal problem, it falls under your sovereignty, and I'm respectful of your sovereignty. But I don't see sovereignty as a way of closing the doors on the international community's concerns with the suffering of people needing assistance and protection.

"I see sovereignty as a concept of responsibility by a state to protect its citizens, to give them the assistance that they need," Deng said.

"And if the state cannot do it because of a lack of resources or a lack of capacity, then it should fall on the international community."

Again, this is becoming a widely accepted way of viewing the problem:

Bill Freylick, director of the refugee program for Amnesty International USA, said Cohen and Deng "are very effective advocates, and they have done really a remarkable job in influencing heads of state, ambassadors to the United Nations, the heads of U.N. humanitarian agencies and the nongovernmental field as well."

...Freylick said Cohen and Deng took the sovereignty defense of nations that want to avoid international scrutiny and "turned it on its head."

"They have broken new ground," he said. "The guiding principles on internal displacement have shifted the focus on uprooted people generally to create a much broader recognition of the human-rights violations that face people who are essentially refugees except that they haven't crossed an international border."

Deng and Cohen said that the cash prize "will be spent on the project they direct on internal displacement."

Disclosure: I oversee the administration of this prize.

Note also: the "responsibility to protect" logic has also been employed by some to discuss a "duty to prevent" unconventional security threats from rogue states with WMD and/or terrorists.

This has implications for the debate about the so-called "Bush Doctrine," but for now I'll reserve further comment on the continued life or death of that policy.