The NY Times has a frustrating story today.

BAGHDAD, June 3 — Three months after the start of the Baghdad security plan that has added thousands of American and Iraqi troops to the capital, they control fewer than one-third of the city’s neighborhoods, far short of the initial goal for the operation, according to some commanders and an internal military assessment.

The American assessment, completed in late May, found that American and Iraqi forces were able to “protect the population” and “maintain physical influence over” only 146 of the 457 Baghdad neighborhoods.

In the remaining 311 neighborhoods, troops have either not begun operations aimed at rooting out insurgents or still face “resistance,” according to the one-page assessment, which was provided to The New York Times and summarized reports from brigade and battalion commanders in Baghdad.

So, the now-famous surge escalation of the great Napoleonic expert Fred Kagan that was once hyped as the strategy that would save Baghdad, Iraq, Mideast oil, and the plummeting fortunes of George W Bush, failed business man, failed politician, and erstwhile Emperor is not working. This is truly amazing. Who could have ever guessed that sending more troops to die needlessly in the cauldron of Iraq wouldn’t work out?

In fact, it was only yesterday that Robert Kagan, Fred’s brother, loyally stood up on his hind legs in the WaPo and defended Fred’s plan as the best thing since pasteurized milk, while pointing out that all the rational and sane people in the world are unfairly criticizing his brother’s magnum opus by using “irresponsible” logic. Further, they are unpatriotic, or something.

Blaming the Iraqis also allows Republicans to acquiesce in defeat without having to acknowledge that it is an American defeat. We didn't fail, the Iraqis did. And blaming the Iraqis clears the American conscience. We got rid of Saddam Hussein, Republicans will say. The rest was up to them, and they failed. The more sophisticated will declare that the Iraqis were culturally destined to fail.

As with any good cover story, there is just enough truth in this one to sell it to those who need an excuse. The Iraqi government has been a disappointment. Sunni and Shiite leaders don't have an easy time compromising with one another, as opposed to, say, Democrats and Republicans in Congress. Sectarian killings continue.

It is what's wrong with this story, however, that makes it so irresponsible. The fact is that, contrary to so many predictions, Iraq has not descended into civil war. Political bargaining continues. Signs of life are returning to Baghdad and elsewhere. Many Sunnis are fighting al-Qaeda terrorist groups, not their Shiite neighbors. And sectarian violence is down by about 50 percent since December.

Got that? As long as there is bargaining it is not a civil war. And if the bargaining stopped, it would not be a civil war because both sides were still insulting each other, and that’s a form of communication, so it’s all good. Go back to sleep, America, your foreign policy is safe in the hands of the Kagans, the AEI, and the Likud Party.

And notice that some Sunnis are fighting back against the evil al-Qaeda, who everyone knows are backed by the more-evil Iranians and the beyond-evil Syrians. And this is good, because if all those millions of Sunnis weren’t fighting the 1,000 to 1,500 al Qaeda, they’d just be fighting Shiites, and then it would be a civil war and we’d have no business being there.

Mr Kagan tries a bit of logic himself, although it falls kind of flat, which is what you’d expect from the Kagan brother who is not a world-famous military expert:

Al-Qaeda's strategy is to foment sectarian violence by killing both Shiites and Sunnis. How come? If sectarian violence were out of control already, why would al-Qaeda have to stir it up? In fact, it is precisely fear that things will calm down in Iraq that has al-Qaeda working overtime to blow things and people up.

So, you see, these al-Qaeda guys are doing all this themselves. Even with people being killed by signature civil war methods like electric drills through hands and into heads, or cigarette burns on genitals, it’s all al-Qaeda. If al-Qaeda didn’t exist, the Kagans would have had to invent it to explain why the surge escalation wasn’t working.

It’s probably al-Qaeda that is causing the US troops to be using all five of Fed Kagan’s brigades to control only about a third of Baghdad. Crafty bastards, aren’t they? (I mean a-Q, or course – not the Kagans.)

It’s the mental mind-waves emanating from Osama bin-Forgotten, hiding out in Pakistan, that are causing the US troops to occupy so little of Baghdad. Those mind-waves are also causing Iraqis to kill each other. Sunnis and Shia have been killing each other in a blood vendetta since around 800 CE, but that was al-Qaeda too. Did you know they are able to travel back in time?