BBC reports that Vice President Dick Cheney-who predicted in March 2003 that “we will, in fact, be greeted as liberators” and claimed in May 2005 that the insurgency was in its “last throes“-is ready to declare the surge a success. Meanwhile, in the reality-based community, Juan Cole at Informed Comment counters that in July, normally a low-casualty month in Iraq because of the searing heat, U.S. military deaths were nearly double the casualty rate in July 2006.

• July 2003: 48
• July 2004: 54
• July 2005: 54
• July 2006: 43
• July 2007: Now up to 79

[Source: Iraq Coalition Casualty Count]

Cole writes: “If it is the deadliest July ever for US troops in Iraq; if there is a 23% increase in Iraqi deaths over June; if there were more attacks in June than any time since April 2003-how is that a decrease in violence? Somebody explain that to me.”