U.S. Troops Only Control 1/3 of Baghdad

So says the military.

The New York Times reported earlier on Monday that, according to an internal military assessment and local commanders, U.S. and Iraqi troops controlled 146 of Baghdad's 457 neighborhoods.

The New York Times said that, according to the one-page military assessment of the crackdown, troops had either not begun operations or still faced resistance in the capital's remaining 311 neighborhoods.

Frankly, I'm not entirely sure what to make of this. Some of the 311 neighborhoods which aren't "controlled" by the U.S. or Iraqi militaries haven't even had any operations yet. How many? The article doesn't say, even tho that seems like a pretty important piece of information. If the military hasn't begun operations in, say, 300 of the 311 neighborhoods, then this seems kind of like good news, since the rate of success among the neighborhoods which have been subject to military operations would be pretty high. But if operations are forth-coming in only 30 of the neighborhoods, and all the rest of those neighborhoods have rebuffed operations, then it's exceedingly bad news.

Not only that, but I don't know exactly what "control" means. How many of New York City's neighborhoods are "under control" in this way? I suspect the answer is "zero". Of these 311 remaining neighborhoods, how many are actively violent? All of them? Half of them? These are all important pieces of information, necessary for properly appreciating the situation in Baghdad. Unfortunately, the article gives us none of this context, so we're left only with the "1/3" number but not capacity for appreciating it.