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Only a week after the US president announced that many thousands more American military were destined for Iraq, an amazing thing happened. The war ended.

Even as he said, “Victory will not look like the ones our fathers and grandfathers achieved. There will be no surrender ceremony on the deck of a battleship,” a winner was already rising out of the skirmishes.

The combatants were three words. Welcome to the world of Washington English where the field of combat covers a bloodless maze of power in and around the nation’s capitol.

As soldiers gathered their kits and prepared for their trip into the deserts of Mesopotamia, leaders of the world’s strongest power were busy fighting inside the beltway - fighting fiercely over three simple terms: surge, escalate and augment. Even someone who doubts the importance of choosing words can see how these American politicos - congresspersons, presidential spokespersons, and the secretary of state - all struggled to gain ground with just the right word.

Maybe they were thinking of Mark Twain’s caution, “The difference between the right word and the almost right word is really a large matter - it’s the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.”

For even before the president marched out his 3,000-word speech, the three-word battle had been joined. It wasn’t over the phrasings his staff had prepared. Not, for instance, because he used the word, “new”, a heavy-handed 17 times, nor even because he closed with this odd construction: “trust that the Author of Liberty will guide us”.

In fact, he hadn’t uttered surge, escalate or augment in the address. But battles are often fought by proxy on behalf of the powerful. It was back in November, after the elections and before the January address that Pentagon officials had been quoted anonymously in the New York Times, talking about plans for 20,000 more troops. Then the term “surge option” appeared in the press, and it soon became, “the surge”.

Now, surge is a fine word, a powerful word. My dictionary sees it first of all as “a strong, wavelike, forward movement, rush, or sweep”. It’s a word with a built-in narrative. A wave grows larger, then smaller. Surge conjures up images of the sea crashing against a rocky coast, or a passing swell on the ocean, or the sudden rush of storm-driven water onto land.

In military use a “surge force” might mean troops that come in quickly to do a job, then leave.

But less dramatic phrases were offered by the president: “increasing American force levels” and “will be deployed”. In government and media people likewise used lackluster terms like “increase in military forces” and “a substantial but temporary increase in American troop levels”.

These descriptions paled against the short and sexy “surge”, which sounds an awful lot like “urge” and was soon on everybody’s lips.

The secretary of defense tried to dispel the mojo that surge was exerting when he said, “The increase in military forces will be phased in. It will not unfold overnight; there will be no D-Day; it won’t look like the Gulf War.” But surge was still embraced in the buzz.

Then signs of consciousness appeared in the American news media, enough to send the president’s press secretary after the press conference corps: “And so — see, Helen’s got her favorite term, it’s ‘escalation’. You’ve got ’surge’. No, surge is not a term I’ve ever used. ” This was an early sign that new contenders might vie to be the word of choice for the military adventure.

[Thanks for taking this article from EnglishMojo.com.]

In fact, escalation was one of two words that would go toe to toe the day after the president’s speech. It was then that one Nebraska senator, who is a veteran of the Vietnam war, questioned the secretary of state, who is a doctor of political science.

THE SENATOR: My question was the escalation of American troops in Iraq.

THE SECRETARY OF STATE: But I think you asked who was supporting it. … And they know that the augmentation of American forces is part of that plan.

Now, as to the question of escalation, I think that I don’t see it, and the president doesn’t see it, as an escalation. What he sees…

THE SENATOR: Putting 22,000 new troops, more troops in, is not an escalation?

THE SECRETARY OF STATE: Well, I think, Senator, escalation is not just a matter of how many numbers you put in. Escalation is also a question of, are you changing the strategic goal of what you’re trying to do? Are you escalating…

THE SENATOR: Would you call it a decrease, and billions of dollars more that you need…

THE SECRETARY OF STATE: I would call it, Senator, an augmentation…

So there “escalation” and “augmentation” come in. Both from the fine upstanding families, escalate and augment. A bit mannered perhaps, both of them 50 cent words used where ten cent words would fit.

Escalate is a relatively new breed, coming from the Roaring Twenties when the moving stairs known as escalators were the rage. It means primarily to increase in intensity, magnitude, etc. It’s an especially powerful word in America, a word with a history since it came to refer to the spiralling growth of the war in Vietnam.

Augment is the older family, formed about 600 years ago. It means primarily to make larger in size, number, strength, or extent. But though it’s older, it has no widespread emotional import. If fact it’s the sort of low-impact word a lawyer, accountant or plastic surgeon would place in front of their clients.

And that’s how surge, escalate and augment came into the public consciousness over a war halfway around the world. How have they done against each other?

A search of the news for the week after the president’s address to the nation showed surge mentioned with Iraq over 20,000 times. Escalate was mentioned in the same sense about 3,400 times. And augment surfaced with Iraq just 37 times.

But war is hell on words, as it is on people. And we’ll have to see how this story turns out.

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