Because the President and Vice President do not respect the lessons of history, they made a huge mess out of Iraq. They refused to learn from the British experience in Iraq between the two World Wars, when the Brits lost many soldiers to a continuing insurgency.

Making things even worse, the President and Vice President have failed the Iraq test seen from the perspective of ninth-grade arithmetic, the old-fashioned "sums and take aways" stuff.

When you combine the failure to observe the lessons of history and math at the same time, only disaster can occur.

But that's exactly what Bush and Cheney did.

They ignored the lessons of history by ignoring the perfect precedent for Iraq. Not Vietnam, but the Philippines during World War II.

The parallels between Iraq and the Philippines are compelling.

• Both countries were defeated quickly: Iraq by the U.S. and the Philippines by the Japanese.
• Both countries developed insurgencies very quickly.
• Both insurgencies were low-tech: roadside bombs by the Iraqis and machetes by the Filipinos.
• Both countries offered great cover for the insurgents: village culture for the Iraq insurgents, jungles for the Philippine guerrillas.
• In both countries, it was impossible to tell the insurgents from the civilians because the civilians and the warriors dressed alike.
• In both countries, the insurgents masqueraded in official uniforms: military and police uniforms for the Iraqis and captured Japanese army uniforms and military gear for the Philippine guerrillas.
• Both countries boasted a long tradition of insurgency: the Iraqis fighting the British for decades and the Filipinos attacking the Spanish for several centuries. (When the USA "bought" the Philippines from Spain, the only place the Spanish Army controlled was Manila. The four major islands were managed by the natives, who had even drafted a constitution before the Americans muddled in.)

Thus, the Philippines served as a warning lesson for Iraq. Especially about the growth and power of an insurgency.

The Japanese Army made a scientific study of its plight in their World War II occupation of the Philippines. The results of the study became public after the Japanese surrendered in 1945.

The bottom line: The poorly supplied, low-tech Philippine guerrilla forces created a negative 25-to-1 force ratio. Translated: From 1942 to 1945, the presence of 25 Japanese soldiers was required to control each individual Filipino guerrilla. Fortunately for Japan, the emperor poured in huge numbers of troops, enough to keep the insurgency under some semblance of control.

Now let's apply that insurgency arithmetic to Iraq:

If a single Iraqi insurgent can tie down 25 U.S. troops, how many insurgents could 150,000 U.S. and British troops be expected to handle?

The arithmetic: Divide 150,000 by 25 and the answer is 6,000.

That was the tipping point for controlling the insurgency: 6,000 warriors.

Optimists claim there are now over 10,000 insurgents operating in Iraq. Pessimists claim the figure exceeds 20,000. It really doesn't matter which side is right, in that both estimates vastly exceed the tipping point for control.

The truth is that Iraq is out of control. Out of our control at least.

The President and Vice President now realize their horrible mistake in believing the "light forces" concept advanced by Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld and General Tommy Frank (who retired before the insurgency hit the fan).

After firing the 400,000-troop Iraqi Army (which could have been used to maintain order), our leaders are now desperately trying to create a new one.

The President says we will stay the course.

But the course is costing America many destroyed and damaged lives, and enough treasure to sink the economy.

For the want of a history book, a war was launched.

For the want of an arithmetic book, a war was lost.

For the want of an accounting book, an economy might be lost.

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