THE recent lessening of violence in Baghdad, Iraq, has nothing to do with last year’s “surge” in US troop numbers, satellite images suggest.
By comparing the number and brightness of lights switched on at night before, during and after the extra troops were deployed, researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles, were able to track the shifts of Sunni and Shiite populations. They found the lights had dimmed much more in certain Sunni districts, and that this trend began before the surge.
John Agnew, who led the study, suggests the Sunnis were driven out by their Shiite neighbours, reducing…
