Inside the Brookings report a report on reality

The Belmont Club:

The best way to read the Brookings Iraq trip report of Michael O'Hanlon and Kenneth Pollack is not to see which political position it supports (i.e. whether is the Surge working or not) but simply to understand what it says. It plainly says that the question of whether American policy will be successful or not cannot yet be determined -- and then goes on to describe what seems to be working and what seems to be broken. "There is a great deal going well in Iraq but, unfortunately, also a great deal going badly." It is the best of times and the worst of times. How it will all end depends: on what factors exactly we will attempt to discover by a close reading.

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The growing effectiveness of the Iraqi Army essentially means that the total force available to the Coalition is growing because IA units can now replace US units in a growing number of cases.

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The political situation is jammed so tight that the US military is simply constructing a parallel police force to outflank the Ministry of the Interior and the NP, an unsatisfactory expedient whose only virtue is that there is no other alternative.

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Indeed a considerable part of the US effort seems devoted to simply finding ways to devolve solutions to localities in order to avoid the central systems altogether.

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One of the most striking recommendations of the Brookings trip report is to give up on the national politicians altogether in favor of a strategy of working directly with the grassroots and creating a fait accompli.

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The need to succeed in Iraq from the "bottom up" is the fundamental reason why schemes which emphasize a rapid withdrawal of US forces and a reliance on high-level diplomatic solutions or UN involvement are likely to fail....

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There is much more in the long thoughtful post which also haas several excerpts from the actual report. Wretchard's point of the bottom up aspects is one that needs to be impressed on those in Washington who actually care about the success of our mission. there is some indication that a few Democrats are coming to realize the significance of what the surge is accomplishing. Hopefully they will also comprehend the significance of the grass roots reconciliation that I have been pointing out for weeks. Top down reconciliation was always a long shot in Iraq and it is quickly becoming irrelevant. It is time that people like Warner see beyond the defeatist rhetoric of his Democrat colleagues and back the winning strategy of the military.

This post on Ralph Peters interview with Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno makes clear that the military leadership understands how it should end. Hopefully, the politicians will catch up.

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