“It’s interesting. We have had, this week, the colonel in charge of Anbar Province say that it’s a civil war; it’s been lost.“
Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV)
September 13, 2006
“I oppose an escalation of U.S. troops, which I do not believe will contribute to long-term success in Iraq.”
Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY)
January 18, 2007
The article referenced below outlines exactly what I’ve been saying over the past two years— “We haven’t been defeated militarily but we have been defeated politically — and that’s where wars are won and lost.”
Rep. John Murtha (D-PA)
Quoting a Washington Post Article
September 11, 2006
“The violence in Anbar has gone down despite the surge, not because of the surge. The inability of American soldiers to protect these tribes from al-Qaida said to these tribes, ‘We have to fight al-Qaida ourselves.’ It wasn’t that the surge brought peace here.“
Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY)
September 4, 2007
One year to the day that President George W. Bush announced a surge of troops into Iraq, a US general today announced that the once lost Anbar Province would be turned over to Iraqi officials in March.
Iraqi soldiers march in formation during a ceremony marking one year since Iraqi security forces took control of Najaf, 160 kilometers (100 miles) south of Baghdad, Iraq on Thursday, Jan. 10, 2008. (AP Photo/Alaa al-Marjani)
The AP reported:
Iraq’s western province of Anbar, origin of the Sunni Arab insurgency that arose in the early months of U.S. occupation, will be returned to Iraqi control in March, a senior U.S. general said Thursday.
Thus far, nine of 18 Iraqi provinces have reverted to Iraqi control, most recently the southern province of Basra in December. The process has gone substantially slower than the Bush administration once hoped, mainly because of obstacles to developing sufficient Iraqi police and army forces.
Marine Maj. Gen. Walter E. Gaskin, commander of the roughly 35,000 Marine and Army forces in Anbar, said levels of violence have dropped so significantly — coupled with the growth and development of Iraqi security forces in the province — that Anbar is ready to be handed back to the Iraqis.
He said in a telephone interview that a provincial security committee under Anbar’s governor has been established and has rehearsed procedures for handling any security crisis that might develop.
Under a plan accepted by the Iraqi government as well as the top two American authorities in Iraq — Ambassador Ryan Crocker and Gen. David Petraeus — the U.S. military will transfer control of Anbar to provincial authorities in March, followed by a ceremony in April, Gaskin said.
But, But But… The Far Left discusses the “what if’s”…
“So what if Petraeus says he needs to maintain surge-level forces indefinitely and the Joint Chiefs say the only way to do that would be to cut back on deployments in Afghanistan but our commanders in Afghanistan say they can’t afford to cut back.”
What if?
There is always hope on the Left that the US will fail after all.
UPDATE: Jules Crittenden has more on the Iraq success story.
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