The American Thinker blog has an article on what went right in Iraq written by Randall Hoven, who is an adjunct professor in the Engineering School of Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville.  He will have an article on what went wrong in tomorrow’s blog.  But he brings up some interesting points that sometimes go unnoticed in the debate.

For example, there have been civilian casualties in the war in Iraq, and that is unfortunate, but the rate of civilian casualties in the war is lower than the number of civilian casualties caused by Saddam’s wars on his neighbors.  During Saddam’s rule and his  twenty years of war on his neighbors, he killed an average of 70,000 people a year including his own people.  Many of his own people he buried in mass graves.  During the five years of the war in Iraq, the civilian death count is listed as approximately 95,000.  That’s a lot less than during the reign of Saddam.

The article cites the statistics of the economic recovery that Iraq is making and the growth of its economy.  It also points out that the majority of the provinces of Iraq have been stable for quite some time.  The growth of a wide variety of news media rather than just Baghdad Bob is also mentioned.  In some ways, they may be doing better than we are!

Anyway, the article is interesting to read in that it reminds us of the big picture.  I am looking forward to reading the other half of the story tomorrow.