The more I think about it, the more I’m irked by that AP “fact check” that tries to persuade the world that Obama wasn’t wrong when he described U.S. operations in Afghanistan as “just air-raiding villages and killing civilians.”

CampaignSpot reader Merv raised some really important points:

The fact is that the AP doesn’t have a clue as to whether our forces killed civilians in Afghanistan. Since the Taliban do not wear uniforms or wear dog tags all of those so-called “civilian casualties” could have been Taliban and the AP or whomever it relied on would not be able to tell. There is also the added factor that the Taliban’s failure to wear uniforms puts all civilians at risk. That is also a violation of the Geneva Conventions which is rarely if ever mentioned in AP reports. Further to the extent that there may be civilian casualties associated with attacks on Taliban it is highly likely that they were human shields taken by the Taliban in a cowardly attempt to avoid their own destruction.
The Taliban in recent weeks have been playing a victimization card with unsupported claims of civilian deaths in our air attacks. That the AP and Obama would repeat enemy propaganda in a political campaign should be exposed.

And Captain Ed finds the kind of data I hunted for yesterday, and couldn’t find: “The Congressional Research Office did a breakout of deployed American forces in Afghanistan. It shows that of the roughly 22,000 American troops in the country, only 3100 come from the Air Force. Over 17,000 come from the Army. You know — ground troops.”

Obama screwed up. Much like his comments about “ten thousand dead” from a tornado, he was probably tired and not thinking straight, or he just got a roll pandering to an anti-war audience and decided to offer up a depiction of our military right out of the post-Vietnam “you baby killers!” playbook. He ought to just come out and admit it, instead of watching the entire press corps try to convince to the the public that yes, our policy really is “just air-raiding villages and killing civilians.”

UPDATE: I am struck by the response I’m getting from lefty readers, which focuses on two themes. One is, “Obama didn’t mean what he said” — which may very well be true, but all we have to go on is the words he used, and if he didn’t mean it as it came out, we should be hearing that from Obama, not from you guys.

The other is, “yes, but Obama is right because there are lots of civilian casuaties in Afghanistan.” Again, the fact that there are civilian casualties are not in dispute, but the points raised above about the Taliban not wearing uniforms raises the reasonable point that determining which dead bearded guy in civilian clothes was a Talibannie and which one was a local civilian isn’t all that simple.

I’m also hearing, “we’re too reliant on air power,” and some folks citing this report in the New York Times:

A senior British commander in southern Afghanistan said in recent weeks that he had asked that American Special Forces leave his area of operations because the high level of civilian casualties they had caused was making it difficult to win over local people.

If it’s coming from a British commander, it’s worth hearing him out. But that article also notes:

The chief British press officer in Helmand, Col. Charles Mayo, defended the American Special Forces and said they were essential to NATO’s efforts to clear out heavily entrenched Taliban insurgents.
An American military spokesman said United States Special Forces would continue to operate in Helmand for the foreseeable future. He denied that their tactics had caused greater civilian deaths and blamed the Taliban for fighting from civilian compounds…
For months, frequent reports of civilian casualties have trickled out of Helmand, scene of some of the fiercest battles of the recent war. But there has rarely been independent confirmation of the reports because the province has been too dangerous for journalists to visit.

Sending additional U.S. troops may help the situation, it may not help the situation – but there’s little to indicate additional U.S. troops would automatically result in fewer civilian casualties.