AP: We're Winning the Iraq War

In an article titled "U.S. Winning Iraq War That Seemed Lost" published over the weekend, the Associated Press seemed finally to realize that the United States is making significant progress in Iraq, and that the day may soon come when U.S. forces are able to leave, turning over security to an increasingly capable Iraqi government.

"The United States is now winning the war that two years ago seemed lost," the AP reports, going on to say, "...the Iraqi government and the U.S. now are able to shift focus from mainly combat to mainly building the fragile beginnings of peace - a transition that many found almost unthinkable as recently as one year ago."

I'll be the first to admit that I didn't think the addition of five brigades of U.S. combat troops would do much to reduce the horrific levels of violence Iraq was experiencing in 2006. But I underestimated the psychological impact that the president's action would have on the conflict. By upping the ante at a time when everyone expected a humiliating U.S. retreat, President Bush sent a message to Iraq, Iran, and the rest of the world that we would not back down in defeat, and that the fight was far from being over.

The addition of five more brigades of U.S. combat power had multiple effects both within and outside of Iraq. It allowed commanders on the ground, armed with a new strategy and new forces, to maintain a presence in areas cleared of insurgents, preventing the return of the bad guys that had characterized the conflict up to that point. It sent a message to the fragile Iraqi government that it would not be abandoned, and that if Iraqi forces wouldn't target Shi'a militias like the Mahdi Army, U.S. forces would. It let the Sunnis know that they would not be subject to wholesale slaughter in an ethnic cleansing campaign by the formerly repressed majority. It put additional pressure on al-Qaeda in Iraq and it let the Iranians know that we would not cede dominance of Iraq to the clerics in Tehran.

As a result, the U.S. and Iran began serious back channel talks about stabilizing Iraq, the Maliki government began to target Shi'a death squads, Muqtada al-Sadr called for a cease fire, and Sunni insurgents turned against al-Qaeda knowing they had other options available to them. These combined events dramatically improved the security situation in Iraq to the point where the United States can now consider withdrawing some of its pre-surge forces if the tactical successes hold. As the Associated Press notes, "...organized resistance, with the steady drumbeat of bombings, kidnappings, assassinations and ambushes that once rocked the capital daily, has all but ceased." And as goes Baghdad, so goes the rest of Iraq. Baghdad has always been the center of gravity in this fight.

Now, the war in Iraq is by no means won. The gains of the past year are reversible and the emerging peace is still very fragile. But the United States and the government of Iraq are clearly in a much stronger position than they were just twelve months ago. So Senator Obama is correct when he says that the surge alone is not responsible for the vast improvements we are seeing in Iraq. But none of the other contributing factors could have taken hold without the decision by the president to demonstrate American resolve through the commitment of additional U.S. combat forces to the fight.