Military Against It?

[posted by Callimachus]

Jim Webb's response had some good moments and a few flat ones and a few odd ones. But this one set me a-Googling:

The majority of the nation no longer supports the way this war is being fought; nor does the majority of our military.

Emphasis added. What is that based on? There's plenty of anecdote, but the closest I can come to statistical evidence is this year-end survey by Military Times newspapers.

The survey, mailed to 6,000 active-duty subscribers to Military Times' four newspapers aimed at the military services, showed that 42 percent of those surveyed disapprove of Mr. Bush's handling of the war, compared with 35 percent who support it.

It marks the first time that the president's Iraq war policies failed to gain majority support since the Military Times began its annual survey four years ago.

I'm guessing that's what Webb would cite as his source, given the careful way he worded it (not "the war" but "the way the war is being fought"). But as Military Times itself points out, the poll is hardly scientific. Nor is it necessarily representative of the armed services as a whole.

As with most such surveys, the phrasing of the questions doesn't allow you to learn much from the answer. I can "disapprove" of Bush's handling and think we all ought to just come home and forget about Iraq. I can also "disapprove" it and think we ought to be more committed to Iraq and start throwing around more lead and manpower over there.

Yet only about three paragraphs into the news story someone blows through the stop sign and makes the unwarranted leap from a decline in "support of Mr. Bush's handling of the war" to "decline in support of the war," which is not at all the same thing.

Opinions of military people and their families about a war in process are going to be complex and involve qualities such as honor, personal risk, the military's "can-do" attitude, and their sense of whether their sacrifices are appreciated by the rest of us.

Deep down in the story, Phillip Carter of the blog Intel Dump (and himself "an Army Reserve captain who served in Iraq in 2004") ascribes the negative results in large part to justified "skepticism."

"The real gap is between the expectations of 2002 and the realities of 2007. ... The military has worked its butt off in Iraq and Afghanistan, and they will accept the sacrifice of being in harm's way if it's going to work. If it's not going to work, they're going to ask if it's worth it."

Or, as another commenter puts it, "The management of the war has been consistently problematic, and a lot of troops see the surge as just another [half-baked] policy to wage war on the cheap. There's a lot of concern that we just continue to sacrifice while everyone else goes shopping."

When you go to the poll itself you start to see some of what the newspaper article omitted. Such as:

The poll asked, “How do you think each of these groups view the military?” Respondents overwhelmingly said civilians have a favorable impression of the military (86 percent). They even thought politicians look favorably on the military (57 percent). But they are convinced the media hate them — only 39 percent of military respondents said they think the media have a favorable view of the troops.

Which would be a story of itself, but don't be looking for it in your morning paper.

UPDATE 1/25: Mystery Pollster takes up the topic (and here, too), and seems to find the military Times readership mail survey somewhat more worthy of attention than I thought it would be:

So, to sum up: The use of the Military Times subscriber list as a sample frame gets us to as close to a random sampling of active duty military personnel as we are likely to get. However, it is best to think of the poll as consistent three year sampling of "the military's professional core" (as the Times' lead puts it) than of all the men and women serving on active duty.

Which still, however, leaves it with the same set of problems any such poll would have: "[W]ere the 70% who did not return their survey different from those who did, and if so, how different were they? That question is, of course next to impossible to answer or quantify, since as usual we know nothing about the non-respondents." He's the expert, not me, so I'll defer to him. Read the whole thing, as they say, and the comments are good as well.

Some might think I'm having it both ways by pointing out that the MT poll might not be an accurate representation of the troops' attitude toward the war, while at the same time reveling in what it purports to reveal about their attitude toward the media.

But it doesn't seem to me that that sword cuts both ways. If you assert the survey is an accurate measuring tool (as anti-war types and the media -- yes, I'm aware of the redundancy -- do), then you're stuck with the harsh view of the media. I don't think the poll was good enough to build policy on. Which means maybe the troops on duty are against the war and maybe they're not, but this isn't good evidence for it. Ditto with the troops and the media.

So my observation at the end of the post was for those who have grasped the poll as proof of their worldview, suggesting they grabbed a sword with two blades and no hilt. And journalism, as I always tell you, is the Art of Leaving Things Out. If you want to track biases, you look there.

Credit and Credulity

According to a Harris poll in late April, a plurality of Americans, 49 percent to 36 percent, believe "clear evidence that Iraq was supporting al Qaeda has been found." This oddity often is blamed on officials in the Bush Administration -- especially Cheney -- who often speak as though they believe there was a "connection."

The nuances of the noun "connection" have been parsed out in the Senate Intelligence Committee report and elsewhere, and while it seems there were overtures and some passive connections between Saddam and Osama, nobody in the administration has seriously suggested that Iraq was directly backing al Qaida, bankrolling their flying lessons and whatnot.

Yet a big chunk of the American people believe this, and Bush is said to bear the blame.

Now, according to a National Annenberg Election Survey released today, half of young Americans (age 18 to 29) believe President Bush wants to reinstate the military draft. This despite the denials of the Bush Administration that it desires any such thing. Bush says so. Rumsfeld says so. The House Republicans even went through a very public performance of trouncing and pissing on a "bring back the draft" bill this week. Yet among American adults of all ages, about 37 percent thinks a renewed draft is Bush's dream right now.

Maybe the fact is that about a third to a half of Americans think what they damn well please, no matter what the facts in the reports say, no matter what the administration says or doesn't say. How else to explain the ongoing cottage industry in UFOs, Kennedy conspiracy theories, and Nieman Marcus cookie recipes?

Democrats: The Other French

Transatlantic Trends 2004 is a public opinion survey undertaken annually by the German Marshall Fund of the United States and the Turin-based Compagnia di San Paolo. In June, the group polled 11,000 Americans and Europeans on issues of common concern. This is the third year for the survey, which gives it some basis for seeing trends.

The poll, released Sept. 9, is a rich lode of statistics. The poll sponsors conclude that it shows that the deterioration in European-American relations has "hardened over the last year, confirming a fundamental change in transatlantic relations may be underway." Not surprisingly, to anyone who's read the European chat sites, 76% of Europeans disapprove of U.S. foreign policy, an increase of 20 percentage points over the past two years.

In analyzing American public opinion and comparing it across the pond, the report finds that those who sarcastically accuse John Kerry of being "French" actually have a point: "Democrats are more closely aligned with majority European views than are Republicans."

On the topic of Bush's foreign policy, for instance, French and Kerry backers are in near exact agreement: 86% of French disapprove, and 88% of Kerry backers disapprove.

To the question, was overthrowing Saddam worth the cost, yes or no, in the U.S. overall the percentage split was 44 (yes) to 50 (no). In France, the split was 8-89; among Kerry backers, it was 9-87. Bush supporters said "yes" by a factor of 80-16.

Is U.N. approval "essential" before any use of military force? In France, 86% said "yes," as did 83% of Kerry supporters. Among Bush backers, only 29% said so.

In some cases American Democrats are more "French" than the French. When it comes to the U.N., 67% of French had a "very favorable" or "mostly favorable" opinion of the organization; 79% of Kerry supporters did. Only 45 percent of Bush supporters did.

On some issues, however, U.S. voters, however far apart, were closer to one another than to their Europeans counterparts. To the statement, "Under some conditions, war is necessary to obtain justice," in France, only 33% agreed. This is opposed to 73% of likely Kerry voters and 91% of likely Bush voters who agreed with that.

It only confirms the obvious, but Democrats are now the more isolationist party of the two. In answer to the question, "Do you think it will be best for the future of the United States if we take an active part in world affairs or if we stay out of world affairs?" Some 85% of Bush supporters preferred an active role; 15% more than the 70% of Kerry backers who said so.

Some 63% of Democrats disapprove of U.S. troops in Iraq, while 83% of Republicans and 54% of Independents approve.

Here's a tid-bit that may interest those who think "blood for oil" is an American peculiarity: the survey asked people if they would approve of the use of their nation's military force "to ensure the supply of oil:" in the U.S., 44 percent did, but in France 50 percent did.

The survey also neatly identified the "undecideds" in this election:

Independents resemble Democrats in their support of EU leadership in world affairs; desire to see a closer U.S.-EU partnership, and warmth toward the EU. They are similar to Republicans in their support of troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and willingness to bypass the UN on vital interests. Independents are divided on Bush’s foreign policy and the role of military power.

One of the interesting conclusions to emerge is that Europeans want their continent to be more independent of the U.S. when it comes to world politics, while Americans look toward Europe as their preferred partner for resolving global issues. Specifically, 60% of Americans believe the partnership between the U.S. and E.U. should become closer, while 58% of Europeans believe the E.U. should take a more independent line in security and diplomatic affairs.

(Or, as Protein Wisdom puts it: Democrats to Europeans: “love us as we love you, sweet Mother Europe, for we, too, are educated and luxuriate in nuance.” Europe to Americans: “go choke on a Big Mac, you obese Yankee morons.")

In the "you've got to pay to play" department, 71% of Europeans believe the EU should become a superpower like the U.S., but 47% of those that agree with this statement dropped their support if doing so would costs more money.

Craig Kennedy, President of the German Marshall Fund, said the trends, if they continue, could end in “a redefinition of the fundamentals of the transatlantic relationship from a first-choice partnership to an optional alliance when mutually convenient.”

Americans and Europeans agree on the big threats: terrorism and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. But they sharply differ on how to handle them. Americans are more willing to use military force and to act without an international mandate. Europeans require an international mandate for military action.

[The European data came from 10 nations: Germany, France, Great Britain, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, and Turkey.]