Wednesday, June 11, 2008

We are winning the war in Iraq

Monday's New York Post's op-ed by Arthur Herman laid it on the line: America is winning the war in Iraq. Herman wrote:

America has won, or is about to win, the Iraq war.

The latest proof came last month, as the Iraqi army - just a few months ago the target of scorn and abuse from Democratic politicians and journalists - forcefully reoccupied three cities that had served as key insurgency bases (Basra, Sadr City and Mosul).

Sunnis and Shias alike applauded as their nation's army compelled insurgent militias to lay down their arms. The country's leading opposition newspaper, Azzaman, led the applause for the move into Mosul - a sign that national reconciliation in Iraq is under way and probably irreversible. ...

In a Washington Post interview, CIA Director Michael Hayden said we're witnessing the "near strategic defeat of al Qaeda in Iraq." ...

Now the strategy, which our nation's "best and brightest" regularly dismissed as a failure, has cleared the way for the establishment of a secure democracy in Iraq and a lasting peace. ...

In wars, however, trends have their own momentum. And the trend is running away from al Qaeda and its jihadist allies - not only in Iraq but also across the Middle East. ...

And al Qaeda's fugitive leadership is learning that its former safe haven along the Afghan-Pakistan border is no longer so safe. Thanks to cooperation with Pakistan's new government, unmanned US Predator drones recently killed two top al Qaeda leaders there.

Once Gen. David Petraeus is confirmed as commander of US forces in the Middle East in July, he'll be able to apply the same strategy for victory learned in the Iraq surge to the war in Afghanistan.

In short, the larger War on Terror may be reaching a tipping point similar to that of the Iraq war. ...

It's not mere coincidence that our success against al Qaeda globally comes along with success in Iraq. For all its setbacks and frustrations, the Iraq war drew jihadists into a battle they thought they could win, because it would be fought on their home turf - but which they're now losing disastrously. ...
Check out the NY Post to read the entire op-ed.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I've ready Arthur Herman's book "How the Scots Invented the Modern World: The True Story of How Western Europe's Poorest Nation Created Our World and Everything in It." It's a great book and probably the book with the longest title I've ever read.