Belmont Club:
US casualties to this point in September have been a third of those for the same month point in time as last year, despite the Tal-Afar offensive. One possible explanation is as Iraq the Model suggests, "the poor training of the new recruits" as the more experienced enemy fighters are killed off. If he is right, then the enemy would logically aim his remaining assets at soft targets. Although no definite information is in yet, the Baghdad attacks against US formations were probably far less deadly than those delivered against the jobless Shi'ite construction workers. Ironically the harder it becomes to hit American troops, the more likely the enemy is to turn his sights on civilian targets.
There is very little military value to massacring jobless people, as even the dimmest bulbs in Al Qaeda would realize. Therefore the goals of this attack must be entirely political: to hearten the insurgency's supporters and possibly to provoke a sectarian war. However, it may have the entirely opposite effect and strengthen the government's public mandate to do whatever it takes to wipe out the insurgents. Iraq the Model says, "this reminds me of Saddam when he felt that his end was nearing and called the battle "the hawasim" (the final or decisive) and it was indeed as it ended his reign." (Emphasis added.)
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