I don't know if it's deliberate or not, but Secretary Gates arranged a sentence today in a way that seemed to imply that Iranian supplied materiel is responsible for 70% of US casualties in Iraq. In his press conference today, he said:

I think the principal area where we have seen evidence of Iranian involvement is in providing these EFPs, these very powerful IEDs, to the -- either or both the technology and the weapons themselves that have been killing American soldiers. And so our effort is aimed at uprooting the networks that are providing these EFPs. We're also trying to uproot the networks that provide the IEDs as well that are being provided -- or being used by al Qaeda and others. These darn things account for about 70 percent of our casualties. And so there's a huge effort under way to try and uproot these networks and try and stop this. So that's the principal area.

Wow, so Iran is providing these EFPs, and EFPs are IEDs, and "these darn things" account for about 70 percent of US casualties.

But back up. Other sources have recently indicated that approximately 85% of US troop casualties in Iraq are attributed to the Sunni insurgency. And EFPs are only a subset of IEDs killing US troops in Iraq. Is Gates deliberately trying to suggest otherwise? Or was it unintentional, the likelihood that some listeners will mistakenly assume that 70% of US casualties are due to Iranian-supplied IEDs? The small matter of the failure to mention that he hasn't told you how many of the IEDs are allegedly Iranian-supplied EFPs?

I called the Pentagon. They said that is not what Gates intended to imply. A spokeswoman told me tonight, "What we have been saying generally is that about 70% of our casualties have been because of IEDS. Not that 70% are coming from Iran." How many of the IEDs killing US troops are thought to come from Iran? For that, she said, I would have to ask the insurgents. You don't have an estimate, I asked? No. A small percentage, large percentage? No answer. Call Centcom (which I will).

If you think such rhetorical devices are not effective, check out this USA Today piece from the other day. Entitled, "US blames Iran for new bombs in Iraq," it concludes:

IEDs are the largest killer of U.S. troops in Iraq. According to Pentagon figures through Jan. 20, they have killed 1,327 troops and wounded 11,861 others.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates said last week, "We are trying to uproot these networks that are planting IEDs that are causing 70% of our casualties."

Maybe next time Gates can point out that he doesn't have available at hand figures for how many of the IEDs are thought to come from Iran. Maybe he could even get Centcom to forward him an estimate.

Posted by Laura at February 2, 2007 05:33 PM