Thomas Ricks on the direction of the war in Afghanistan under Petraus

Thomas E. Ricks has the bona fides to produce a worthwhile assessment of the leadership change in Afghanistan:

This week's confrontation between a senior Army general and the president of the United States may have signaled the beginning of the end of the war in Afghanistan. In a year or two, President Obama will be able to say that he gave the conflict his best shot, reshaping the strategy and even putting in charge his top guy, the general who led the surge in Iraq -- but that things still didn't work out.

Then he can begin pulling out.
(The Washington Post)

 The early buzz about Gen. Petraeus' approach to his new command make me wonder if perhaps Petraeus will prove his mettle beyond what Ricks had imagined.  I refer to reports that Petraeus intends to relax the rules of engagement.  The Rolling Stone piece that helped sink Gen. Stanley McChrystal pointed out that the restrictive rules of engagement represent a huge problem for the troops.  A change by Petraeus may help produce the type of mission unity that Ricks doubts that Petraeus can reproduce from Iraq.

Obviously the political liason problem persists, at least for now.

Senators Obama and Clinton back "Betray-us"?

General David Petraeus, who led the "surge" strategy largely credited with reversing the trend of increased violence in post-Saddam Iraq, received confirmation from the United States Senate today:

WASHINGTON (AFP) — The US Senate on Thursday voted to confirm the promotion of General David Petraeus, currently the top US general in Iraq, to head all US operations in the Middle East, including the war in Afghanistan.

Petraeus, the architect of the troop surge escalation strategy credited by the Bush administration with improving security in Iraq, will be promoted to run US Central Command.

The vote was 95-2 in the 100-member Senate on the Petraeus nomination.

(Agence France-Presse)

Though I haven't located a breakdown as to who voted in favor, the dissenting votes came from Democrats Robert Byrd and Tom Harkin. Byrd reportedly voted against in part because he preferred to see Petraeus stay in charge of operations in Iraq.

What about the presidential candidate who held two consecutive press conferences to make clear his commitment to a rapid redeployment timetable? Barack Obama said back in April that he would vote to confirm Petraeus as head of Centcom.

"Yes," Obama told "Fox News Sunday" when asked if, as a senator from Illinois, he would approve Petraeus. "I think Petraeus has done a good tactical job in Iraq."

And what of Democratic presidential runner-up Hillary Clinton? Clinton famously told Gen. Petraeus that his report to Congress required "a willing suspension of disbelief." That's a kind way of calling somebody either delusional or a liar (or both). It appears that Clinton was able to engage her suspension of disbelief and find the deluded/liar Petraeus worthy to command our troops.

Isn't that nice?

Moments like this one give me some faint hope that Democrats aren't as agonizingly stupid regarding national security issues as they ordinarily appear. Plus it's fun watching Obama and Clinton supporters try to reconcile the various behaviors coming from their preferred candidates.

The Times: Surge working, Dems ignoring

The current achievements, and they are achievements, are being treated as almost an embarrassment in certain quarters. The entire context of the contest for the Democratic nomination for president has been based on the conclusion that Iraq is an absolute disaster and the first task of the next president is to extricate the United States at maximum speed. Democrats who voted for the war have either repudiated their past support completely (John Edwards) or engaged in a convoluted partial retraction (Hillary Clinton). Congressional Democrats have spent most of this year trying (and failing) to impose a timetable for an outright exit. In Britain, in a somewhat more subtle fashion admittedly, Gordon Brown assumed on becoming the Prime Minister that he should send signals to the voters that Iraq had been “Blair's War”, not one to which he or Britain were totally committed.

All of these attitudes have become outdated. There are many valid complaints about the manner in which the Bush Administration and Donald Rumsfeld, in particular, managed Iraq after the 2003 military victory. But not to recognise that matters have improved vastly in the year since Mr Rumsfeld's resignation from the Pentagon was announced and General Petraeus was liberated would be ridiculous.
(the Times)

Yes, it would be ridiculous.

I wouldn't mind seeing the Democratic Party continue on its ridiculous tack right up through the 2008 election ... if the voters start to figure it out before Democratic leadership, anyway.

Those who called the war "lost" were nearly correct by virtue of a self-fulfilling prophecy. Lack of political will, along with flawed strategy, gave the insurgency a chance to keep the United States and its allies from victory in Iraq.

A minority with political will combined with an antiwar minority unable to cobble together a coherent foreign policy sustained the war long enough to institute a successful military strategy. As the Times noted, the success of the surge in curbing domestic violence creates the conditions that should make political reconciliation easier to achieve.

Hat tip to Captain's Quarters.

*****

A reminder that the smearing started early

A visitor provided a reminder that the attempt to discredit Gen. David Petraeus got an early start, about four months after Petraeus was confirmed by the Senate to pursue the new surge strategy.

Lawrence J. Korb wrote an op-ed back in late May with the tongue- (and logic) twisting lead phrase "Petraeus is not a reliable source for an unbiased assessment."

Well, duh. Everyone has a bias and obviously Petraeus will be partial to the strategy he designed. So what? None of that matters unless Petraeus actually did something to mislead, such as cherry-picking statistics.

So here's another no-brainer. Larry Korb is not a reliable source for an unbiased assessment of Gen. Petraeus*. Korb works for the progressive think-tank "Center for American Progress." Korb showed what type of operator he is with the lead. The portion designed to stick in the mind is "not a reliable source" trusting that the damning phrase would overshadow the vacuous nothing that was Korb's central observation.

Korb tried to hang the thesis on the following shadow of a framework:

"Petraeus published a misleading commentary in the Washington Post"
Korb conveniently neglected to mention any misleading aspect of Petraeus' commentary. His real complaint is that Petraeus wrote as though the war could be won back when both Bush and Kerry were treating it that way--though Korb paints the situation as though Petraeus unquestionably wrote to insert himself into the election.

"Asking Petraeus to assess the situation in September might be asking him - if the evidence pointed in that direction - to say that his whole counterinsurgency strategy was wrong."

Korb is correct on this point, if we forgive the rather sensational hyperbole. Petraeus' counterinsurgency strategy has been tested over time, and it clearly works. A failure in Iraq would not discredit the strategy, particularly since it has been widely admitted (with Petraeus among those doing do) that political moves serve as the ultimate key to success in Iraq.
As noted earlier, this complaint about Petraeus is a big nothing. Congress wanted Petraeus to report. If they didn't think he could be trusted to give a frank assessment of progress in Iraq then they did a foolish thing in confirming him.

"Another complicating fact is that one purpose of the surge was to buy time for Iraqi reconciliation."
No doubt Korb would prefer for the reader to overlook the irrelevance of this "complicating fact" as it pertains to Petraeus' testimony.

Read it over. Korb tries to make two points against Petraeus and throws in an irrelevancy for good measure. The point about Petraeus not being unbiased is obvious and unimportant by itself. Judges are biased, but we still allow them to try cases. By the same token, it was proper to hear Petraeus give his assessment of the surge. Congress was there to ask questions, and nothing stopped them from using other sources of information to challenge Petraeus' claims.

Bottom line, Petraeus came out looking better than people like Rep. Eliot Engel.

One more word on the objectivity of those who self-assess:

Korb told the Forum audience that he favors a timetable for U.S. troop withdrawl sooner rather than later.
(John F. Kennedy School of Government, Oct. 12, 2006)

In other words, success by Petraeus proves Larry Korb wrong. As to reliability of testimony, Korb is hoist by his own petard.


A hat tip of sorts to Duane.

*I would not ordinarily use this type of phrase as Korb did; the application here is simply to seize the irony.
*****

MoveOn against the current

Was Gen. David Petaeus making things up about the Iraq War just so he could continue leading a dead-end military campaign?

Gallup's polling seems to indicate that Americans don't think so (for some people, that should mean that Petraeus has credibility).

Americans are sending ambiguous messages about what to do in Iraq. On the one hand, they think going to Iraq was a mistake, are dubious the troop surge has been effective or that the war will be won, and would like to start withdrawing U.S. troops on a timetable. Most of these positions run contrary to the message delivered by Petraeus to Congress last week. At the same time, Petraeus is increasingly well-regarded by the public, and his plan for a long-term incremental pullout of Iraq is generally supported. Most Americans come down on the side of saying Petraeus' plans for withdrawal are about right, if not too aggressive.
(Galluppoll.com)

The message is ambiguous because everybody wants our troops to come home, but most know that the consequences of making that move are unacceptable. The shocking thing is that so many Democrat (and even a few Republican) leaders don't seem to see the consequences.

Perhaps their view is obscured by their view of their re-election poll numbers.


*****

Forcing the reality-based to face reality

A visitor calling himself "Duane" apparently thinks that Rep. Engel's comments about General David Petraeus were somehow reasonable.

I don't intend to go back and forth endlessly with Duane in the comments section. I'll address every argument Duane presents, but only if he can keep himself on topic.
After I had pointed out that Duane was treating Petraeus' op-ed comments as though they were predictions (when they weren't), Duane came back with this:

I noticed that you made no comment on Rumsfelds "6 month" PREDICTION. I also noted that Petraeus offered no timeline. If they had told Americans at the beginning that this would last 5+ years they would have run them out of town. If three years of "on track" has not allowed us to remove troops then your track is endless. You are like the out of work brother-in-law that moves in for a "few months" and five years later you are still looking for a job and just need another loan until you get going. All the things that the White House predicts if we pull out, chaos, violence, factional fighting, etc. are happening NOW. We have spent 3400 lives and half a trillion dollars and they have less electricity now than when Saddam was in power. Millions of Iraqis with skills, money or out of desperation have left the country. The Sunni's have completely withdrawn from the central government. Sectarian violence may be down in some areas because they are becoming purely Sunni or Shiite. Not counting car bomb deaths? Assasinations don't count if they are shot in the front of the head? The GAO report bears no resemblance to the Petraeus report?? Just give us 6 more months he says. How about we redeploy to the border and see if the horrible consequences they keep talking of happen? How about listening to the 65% of Americans AND Iraqis that want us out of there?
Duane | 09.13.07 - 10:05 am

1) I pointed out to Duane that the 6 month prediction looked perfectly true. More on this later.
2) Duane offered that he noted that Petraeus offered no time line. How that is supposed to help his case is anyone's guess.
3) Duane opined that if Americans had known the war would take 5 years they wouldn't go along with it. I don't have such a dim view of the average American, though it wouldn't surprise me if liberal circles were substantially filled with people who will give up if the war looks difficult or unpleasantly long. That's an aspect of American culture that bin Laden picked up on, though I trust he's wrong about it.
4) Duane thinks that if three years of "on-track" doesn't result in bringing (how many?) troops home then the track is endless. That doesn't follow. If the track takes 100 years instead of 5 then the track has an ending, obviously. If Duane was merely indulging in hyperbole then he doesn't really have a relevant point--especially with regard to Petraeus' reliability.
5) Duane's out-of-work brother-in-law analogy is inane in this context. Is he supposing anti-war Democrats as the ones giving money to pro-war Republicans? Or is Iraq the freeloader? In the former case, our system of government only works if the minority accedes to cooperate with the laws passed by the majority. In the latter case, Iraq is a multi-faceted entity with immense global strategic importance. The brother-in-law analogy isn't apt where the brother-in-law is of vast strategic importance. If you're smart you'll invest quite a bit in that brother-in-law.
6) Duane thinks that the feared result of a pullout are already happening. Duane apparently has zero sense of scale. Iran, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia are each likely to move to fill a power vacuum in the wake of a U.S. pullout. Is it possible that peace will break out spontaneously in the wake of a U.S. withdrawal? Only in the strict logical sense that also makes it possible for a cow to balance itself spontaneously on top of the Eiffel Tower.
7) Less electricity? Can Duane explain the relevance to Petraeus' testimony? The power grid problem stems from downgraded infrastructure inherited from Hussein plus deliberate attacks by insurgents. The insurgents probably hope that Americans will regard the war as unwinnable if they deprive their own people of electricity.
8) Yes, many Iraqis have fled the country. What does that have to do with Petraeus' testimony before Congress?
9) The Sunnis withdrew from the federal government, but have now returned. Al-Maliki achieved significant progress in compromise deals in August. Not that it's relevant to Petraeus' testimony, from what I can tell.
10) Duane offered that sectarian violence may have subsided because fewer integrated neighborhoods remain. Well, that's a step in the right direction, Duane, allowing that sectarian violence may have decreased.
11) See story linked just above regarding execution-style killings and car bombs.
12) The GAO report relied on civilian attack data through July 2007, the first month that the surge troop levels first hit their target. See page 10 (.pdf). If Duane wants to assert differences in the reports, he should be specific.
13) Redeploy to the border? Which border? Kuwait? Saudi Arabia (they love us there)? Syria (they love us there)? Iran (they love us there)? Turkey? How about Okinawa? And if the violence gets worse you want to go back in when you left because of the violence? Pure genius.
14) We don't listen to the 65 percent (provide a reference any day, now) because they tend to reason like you do. Many people holding to a stupid idea doesn't make it less stupid. The Iraqis appear to be a bit smarter than you paint them, according to this ABC/BBC graph.





Duane followed up with a prediction from General Casey, apparently hoping that the accompanying story would be taken to contradict Petraeus' op-ed assessment. Could you be specific, Duane?

As for predictions, saying that training is "on track" indicates there is a timeline. If you don't meet that goal then either your "on track" statement was wrong or something changed to throw the plan off track. If there is evidence of substantial, measurable success in Iraq I would say the ball is in your court to show it to me. As skeptical as I was about this war I never dreamed we could make it worse for the average Iraqi than they had it under Saddam.

If it indicates a time line, Duane, then why did you earlier note that "Petraeus offered no time line"? Sure, there was an implied time line for the training of Iraqi security forces. Something threw the plan off track. I thought I had already mentioned the attack on the Golden Mosque.

Duane, I don't care if you can't see the progress in Iraq. I don't pretend to be able to open thoroughly closed minds. But I do care to see you support your implied defense of Rep. Engel. You're not up for that, are you?

Petraeus before the House

Hopefully I can be one of the first to make fun of the pathetic swipe at General Petraeus taken by Rep. Eliot Engel (D, New York).

Engel brought up an editorial written by Petraeus, published in the Washington Post, that gave an assessment of progress in Iraq. Engel asked why, given the op-ed, people should believe what Petraeus was saying before Congress.

Petraeus thanked Engel for bringing up the topic, and assured Engel that he could provide an answer.

"I stand by it," Petraeus said.

He went on to say that his assessment in 2004 was accurate. Indeed, if you read it over there isn't much in the way of wild predictions or claims.

Petraeus also pointed out that his assessment predated the destruction of the "Golden Mosque" (Feb 22, 2006), not that he needed a rationale for justifying any failed predictions. This was as strong as the op-ed got:

There will be more tough times, frustration and disappointment along the way. It is likely that insurgent attacks will escalate as Iraq's elections approach. Iraq's security forces are, however, developing steadily and they are in the fight. Momentum has gathered in recent months. With strong Iraqi leaders out front and with continued coalition -- and now NATO -- support, this trend will continue. It will not be easy, but few worthwhile things are.
(Washington Post)

So, Engel committed a fallacy of the complex question, including in his question the false premise that Petraeus' op-ed was not good information, for the purpose of supporting an ad hominem attack on Petraeus.

Shame on you, Rep. Engel.

The St. Petersburg Times braces for Petraeus

No, they're not expecting a late-season hurricane.

Seeing word that the New York Times is disparaging progress in Iraq leading up to General David Petraeus' address to Congress and various committees thereof, I decided to see to what extent I would be "In the Know" thanks to the St. Petersburg Times.

The Sunday story, authored by Wes Allison, avoids any direct assessment of ground conditions in Iraq. Instead, Allison paints the situation in terms of the political debate. Republicans will argue for continuing the surge, rolling the dice despite the unpopularity of the effort, while the Democrats will soften their efforts to set a withdrawal timetable.

The story itself seems political.

Allison throws in some cues to tip off the anti-war crowd that he doesn't necessarily buy the idea that the surge is working--though he does report the reversal of Democrat Brian Baird, who now favors continuing the surge. Positives in terms of security, as well as the negatives in terms of Iraqi politics, are not delivered as objective news, but in terms of the claims of the factions in Washington.

I do give Allison some credit, however. I don't see any unmistakable sign that he dismisses the conservative side of the debate as inherently untenable.

As-is, the story seems crafted to leave unchallenged the thinking of readers regarding the actual situation in Iraq. More importantly, it doesn't touch at all on the consequences for failure in Iraq. That's a bit strange, considering it's the answer to the question Allison chooses to provide the introduction to his story:

Who knew that opposing an unpopular war could be so difficult?
(St. Petersburg Times, read the rest for yourself)

I could have told him that way back in November. If you're a congressional Democrat, you need a plan that doesn't sound stupid, and one that leaves you relatively free of blame if a genocide results in Iraq.

The Democrats have no plan. They're sticking with what got them elected: Criticize Republicans for whatever goes wrong.

Amen

Not much need to add to what Cap'n Ed Morrissey wrote regarding the Democrats' two-facedness regarding General David Petraeus:

At Heading Right, I look at the sudden use of the phrase "the Bush report" in describing Petraeus' testimony, and how it seeks to undermine the integrity of this career officer for the political expediency of the anti-war Democrats. Of particular note is the fact that the same Senators who didn't cast a single vote against this highly-regarded commander taking over the effort in Iraq suddenly feel that Petraeus would conspire with George Bush to deliver a dishonest report to Congress. Which is more likely -- that a career commander would deliberately lie about events in Iraq that already have garnered plenty of independent evidence for success, or that Dick Durbin and Harry Reid would smear the military for their own political gain?

Yes, that's a rhetorical question.

(Captain's Quarters--go read the rest)

I had a dim view of the Democrats' ability to put together a coherent and/or rational policy on Iraq when they gained control of Congress in 2006.

I'm sorry to say that their performance has failed to rise to the level of my low expectations.

James Denselow on Iraq

Analysis of the news, from another planet (reality-based?).

Meanwhile politicians on both side of the Atlantic have taken continued advantage of the huge public support given to the soldiers, despite opposition to the war itself, to defer political decisions to military commanders informed by "conditions on the ground". Yet the abrupt substitution of General Casey for Petraeus shows that if commanders on the ground disagree with new strategies from Washington then they are replaced. President Bush has consistently hidden behind a popular military to explain the catastrophic failure of his Iraqi adventure.

But the president is running out of people to hide behind. Most of the planners of the war have gone and despite an attempt to replace the divisive Rumsfeld with a "big tent" approach by including pragmatic generals like Petraeus, as well as hard bitten realists like Ryan Crooker and Robert Gates, the situation is all but lost. The surge represents a gamble for resurrection, as if by putting more chips on to the table Bush can win back the blood and treasure that has been lost in Iraq over the past four years.

(The Guardian)

I'd be interested to see some polling of "those who oppose the war" that goes into the depth of their opposition.

What would they be willing to allow to get U.S. or British troops out of Iraq? A genocide taking millions of lives? An Iraq in political orbit around Iran? A war between Turkey and Kurdistan?

Is Denselow's perception that Casey replaced Petraeus ("the abrupt substitution of General Casey for Petraeus") an indication of how well he is paying attention?

I don't even understand this sentence: "President Bush has consistently hidden behind a popular military to explain the catastrophic failure of his Iraqi adventure."
How would hiding behind the military "explain" catastrophic failure, if we were to grant that the operation is a catastrophic failure? Does Denselow mean to say that Bush blames the failures on his generals and military advisers? Seems to me that Bush uses "we" when he talks about the successes and failures in Iraq. A pity Denselow provides no examples. How are we supposed to understand the term "explain" as Denselow is using it?

Denselow suggests that the situation in Iraq is "all but lost"--but why? What areas of Iraq are controlled by insurgents? What major victories have insurgents registered? There simply isn't any data that supports the claim that the situation is all but lost except on the political front--and even then the main threat is on the political front in the United Kingdom and in the United States.
A stalemate during an insurgency is not a loss. The analogy has been drawn before, but the type of view Denselow give us could have come during the Civil War or during WW2--except that things were truly poised to be disastrous in both cases. The fastest way to ensure disaster in the case of Iraq would be to institute a speedy withdrawal of U.S. forces.

Denselow talks about the "gamble for resurrection," but again the resurrection is on the political front, since Iraq has never been a dead situation. And the positive happenings in Iraq, exemplified by the flipping of Anbar, provide excellent reason for a corresponding flip in the politics of Iraq.

Apparently that prospect doesn't sit well with folks like Denselow who have their Iraq War narrative mapped out, and intend to stick with it regardless of the facts.

May I call you "Dense" for short, Mr. Denselow?

Progress in Iraq: bad news for Democrats?

Special to the New York Times, via Michael E. O'Hanlon and Kenneth M. Pollack of the (left-favoring) Brookings Institution:

VIEWED from Iraq, where we just spent eight days meeting with American and Iraqi military and civilian personnel, the political debate in Washington is surreal. The Bush administration has over four years lost essentially all credibility. Yet now the administration’s critics, in part as a result, seem unaware of the significant changes taking place.

Here is the most important thing Americans need to understand: We are finally getting somewhere in Iraq, at least in military terms. As two analysts who have harshly criticized the Bush administration’s miserable handling of Iraq, we were surprised by the gains we saw and

the potential to produce not necessarily “victory” but a sustainable stability that both we and the Iraqis could live with.
(New York Times)

This is not the narrative that an ideologically left-tilted mainstream media wants to tell.

War-supporting Republicans and, I hope, Iraqis can take considerable comfort in the fact that left-biased news organizations are typically more interested in telling the truth than they are in pushing their ideological and political agendas. It's just that the agenda sometimes makes it challenging for them to tell the truth effectively.

The bigger conflict, here, is for the Democratic Party, which committed itself to defeat in Iraq. Declaring the surge strategy a "failure" within just a few weeks of the full complement of surge forces deploying is just one of the better examples.

So, how does the Democratic-controlled Congress react to the changing face of the ground situation in Iraq? Do they keep pushing for a vote to start a draw-down of forces prior to General Petraeus' September report?

It's possible. After all, the Democrats moved to signal retreat after receiving reports that the Iraqi government has made little progress despite some significant gains on the "benchmarks" concerning the security situation.

The big factor here, it seems, is the public perception angle. So long as the American people are convinced that things in Iraq are deteriorating, they may forgive Democrats for their retreatist/defeatist stance.

If the public perception changes--look out.

Hat tip to Powerline.

General Petraeus interviewed by Hugh Hewitt

Hugh Hewitt bills his show as "The best in political talk," and it's hard to argue. He brings in heavyweight guests from all over the political spectrum (favoring the right, to be sure), and engages them in conversations that compel something better than the soundbites we usually see with media interviews.

Tonight Hewitt aired an interview with General David Petraeus (the interview actually occurred earlier in the day).

HH: Welcome, General. You took over command of the multinational forces in February of this year, February 10. In the past five months, how have conditions in Iraq changed?

DP: Well, obviously, we have been surging our forces during that time. We have added five Army brigade combat teams, two Marine battalions, and a Marine expeditionary unit, and some enablers, as they’re called. And over the last month, that surge of forces has turned into a surge of offensive operations. And we have achieved what we believe is a reasonable degree of tactical momentum on the ground, gains against the principal near-term threat, al Qaeda-Iraq, and also gains against what is another near-term threat, and also potentially the long term threat, Shia militia extremists as well. As you may have heard, that today, we announced the capture of the senior Iraqi leader of al Qaeda-Iraq, and that follows in recent weeks the detention of some four different emirs, as they’re called, the different area leaders of al Qaeda, six different foreign fighter facilitators, and a couple dozen other leaders, in addition to killing or capturing hundreds of other al Qaeda-Iraq operatives.

(click here to read more)

Here's how Hewitt later summarized the interview:

Read the whole thing for a broad assessment of conditions in Iraq, one that completely contradicts assertions that the surge has failed.
(HughHewitt.townhall.com)

McCain's pre-emptive salvo in the coming battle of the made-up minds

Senator John McCain issued a statement that sums up the stakes in Iraq very effectively. McCain made his statement on the Senate floor, coinciding with the run-up to the all-night debate that will result as Democrats try to put the fili back into filibuster (or something like that).

Here's one of the better pearls of wisdom from McCain:
The supporters of this amendment respond that they do not by any means intend to cede the battlefield to al Qaeda; on the contrary, their legislation would allow U.S. forces, presumably holed up in forward operating bases, to carry out targeted counterterrorism operations. But our own military commanders say that this approach will not succeed, and that moving in with search and destroy missions to kill and capture terrorists, only to immediately cede the territory to the enemy, is the failed strategy of the past three and a half years.
(Powerline forum)
McCain is correct.

This plan the Dems are pushing isn't even the withdrawal that that the anti-war left has looked for. It's just a draw-down in forces that will almost certainly require our military to revert to the failed tactics it employed prior to placing General David Petraeus in charge.

Troop Withdrawal by April 30: Carl Levin (D-MI) and Jack Reed (D-RI) have offered an amendment that would begin a troop pullout within 120 days of enactment, with a deadline for withdrawing most troops by April 30, 2008. A residual force of undefined size would remain for counterterrorism efforts, U.S. force protection and the training of Iraqi security forces.
(NPR)

It's stupid in almost every way, allowing that it may be a good political strategy for the Dems.

NPR seems to detect details of the Levin-Reed amendment that Levin doesn't even mention in his own statement. Levin says nothing about "withdrawing most troops by April 30, 2008." Levin does say "Some have criticized our amendment on the grounds that it doesn't say how many U.S. forces will remain after the transition to the new missions." If NPR's analysis is correct, then Levin set an upper boundary on the forces that will be needed.

Either NPR got it wrong, or Levin's description makes little sense. I think the former is more likely.

Good news from/for Iraq

General Peter Pace refers to a "sea change" in the security situation in Iraq.

Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will be a key figure in offering advice regarding the future of the Iraq War.

(RAMADI, Iraq) — In his most optimistic remarks since the U.S. troop buildup began, Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Tuesday that Iraq has undergone a "sea change" in security in recent months, and that this will influence his recommendation to President Bush on how long to continue the current strategy.

After conferring with Maj. Gen. Walter Gaskin and other commanders in this provincial capital west of Baghdad, Pace told reporters he has gathered a positive picture of the security environment not only here but also in Baghdad, where he began his Iraq visit on Monday.

(Time)

At least one conservative commentator has speculated that conservatives will be painted into a corner come September when Petraeus offers his assessment of the surge strategy to this point.

While it wouldn't be at all surprising for the Democrats to paint the picture in those colors, the reasonable observer should see the sense in waiting for the general's assessment regardless of whether the decision is to continue the surge effort or tuck tail.

Iraq & Vietnam: Reassessing the comparison

The American left (bless their hearts) jumped in pretty early in comparing the Iraq War to the Vietnam War.

Their intent was to assert that that cause there is futile and that withdrawal is the best option for the United States.

The comparison was strained, since the United States did what was planned for Iraq--build up a homegrown security force--and then abandoned South Vietnam by withdrawing the material support we had promised to their security forces. We watched as North Vietnam broke the peace agreement between the two sides. The result was that hundreds of thousands of South Vietnamese were put in reeducation camps and hundreds of thousands more fled the country--many by boat (the Boat People).

And many Americans--especially from the left--seem to think that's an acceptable result--the same strategy that resulted in untold misery in South Vietnam (not to mention Laos and Cambodia) is the one we should employ in Iraq.

That's the part of the comparison that I accept: Removing our support from the constitutional government in Iraq would have a comparably disastrous result for Iraqis, and the damage to the U.S. position in the world would be comparable. The United States was viewed as weak in the aftermath of Vietnam. Along with President Carter's weak leadership, it no doubt encouraged the uprising in Iran that resulted in the ascendancy of the radical regime that today is eagerly trying to acquire nuclear weapons while threatening Israel and criminalizing the wearing of soccer jerseys in public.

While there are many clear differences between the situation then in Vietnam and the situation now in Iraq, another important difference has become increasingly clear: The Iraqi people do not want the insurgents to rule them.

The insurgent forces in Iraq have accumulated a history of badly mistreating Iraqis whenever they gain control of an area. Independent reporter Michael Yon recently documented an instance where the insurgents apparently killed the residents of a village they controlled. This dynamic has led to a surprising turnabout in allegiances. Sunni tribes in Iraq--exactly the group that had been most opposed to the U.S. deposing Saddam Hussein--have increasingly sought out alliances with the U.S. and coalition troops in opposition to the insurgents.

The insurgents, if they were ever mostly Sunni loyalists, seem to have completed their transformation into an al Qaeda-allied coalition of foreigners, and U.S. military forces have increasingly detected signs of cooperation with the Shiite extremists in Iran.

Evidently it's not impossible for extremists from opposite poles of Islam to cooperate against a common enemy.

The strategy of the insurgents, which seems to have placed a premium on eroding public support for the war among U.S. citizens back home, has had the unintended consequence of priming the country for the success of General Petraeus' surge strategy.

That's where the comparison to Vietnam breaks down most notably at present.

While that should be good news, it doesn't necessarily mean anything.

There is a popular discontent with the direction of the Iraq War, fueled partially by a news media that stands ideologically opposed to the war, and additionally fueled by politicians who detect their political future in the resulting winds of public opinion.

The Democratic Party found itself able to wrest control of both houses of Congress from the Republicans based largely on its wide-ranging criticisms of Iraq policy, which had legs because of real failures in executing the war. Once in control of Congress, however, the Democrats found that they had no consensus regarding how to proceed on the Iraq issue. Big surprise, there.

Democratic presidential hopefuls have increasingly hitched their wagons to a policy of cutting short the U.S. effort against the insurgents. The rest of the party will have to follow their eventual presidential candidate on policy--at least up through election day.

What that probably means is that a Democratic victory in 2008 will result in a lost opportunity to win the war in Iraq, and devastation in that region perhaps comparable to what was seen in South Vietnam.

Times (UK) interview with General David Petraeus

Petraeus' sensible comments supply an enormous contrast to the vapid political rhetoric from Hillary Clinton in my previous post.

Interview by Richard Beeston with General David Petraeus in Baghdad on June 20 2007.

What is your priority in the surge operation?

"It is to disrupt al-Qaeda and its ability to conduct sensational attacks and to try to continue the cycle of violence, which they have been trying to do all along. In addition, they are attempting try establish a real al-Qaeda sanctuary in Iraq, a caliphate."
(read more, read it all)

Hat tip to Powerline.