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Casualties, Polls, And The Iraq War, Jason Reifler, Christopher Gelpi
Casualties, Polls, And The Iraq War, Jason Reifler, Christopher Gelpi
Political Science Faculty Publications
In their article “Success Matters: Casualty Sensitivity and the War in Iraq,” Christopher Gelpi, Peter Feaver, and Jason Reifler attempt to flush out the relationship between public opinion and the use of force as it pertains to the Iraq war.1 The authors promote the following proposition: “Our thesis is that expectations of future success are the key determinants of public casualty tolerance. That is, the U.S. public can accept that the war is not yet won and will involve continued and even mounting costs, provided that events thus far are not convincing it that eventual success is impossible” (p. 24). …
Success Matters: Casualty Sensitivity And The War In Iraq", Jason Reifler, Christopher Gelpi, Peter Feaver
Success Matters: Casualty Sensitivity And The War In Iraq", Jason Reifler, Christopher Gelpi, Peter Feaver
Political Science Faculty Publications
In this article, we argue that the public will tolerate significant numbers of U.S. combat casualties under certain circumstances. To be sure, the public is not indifferent to the human costs of American foreign policy, but casualties have not by themselves driven public attitudes toward the Iraq war, and mounting casualties have not always produced a reduction in public support. The Iraq case suggests that under the right conditions, the public will continue to support military operations even when they come with a relatively high human cost. Our core argument is that the U.S. public’s tolerance for the human costs …