1) It won't make any more of a lasting difference than "operation together forward" or any of the other various surges of similar size that have been repeatedly attempted over the last few years. The window in which providing extra security in Baghdad was feasible and might have had an overall impact on the situation in Iraq closed within months after the original invasion. This is a punt, designed to forestall any further development until next November (which the surge sets as the date we will turn over security to the Iraqis), at which point the '08 campaign will be ramping up to full swing and nothing more will be done.

2. It depends which insurgents you mean. Since we aren't going to target Sadr or the Mahdi Army, they will continue killing Sunnis at will. Those Sunni's will melt away, or more precisely be ethnically cleansed out of certain areas, and will concentrate in Anbar province. From Anbar, they will continue to launch car bombs at major Shi'ite population centers, and at the American forces assisting/ignoring the Mahdi Army and Badr Brigade (aka "the Iraqi Security Forces" / "the Iraqi Army" / the Iraqi police').

3. I would draw the conclusion that President Bush is either fundamentally disconnected from reality or is so morally bankrupt that he will not admit his policies failure because it is easier to kick the can down the road and force someone else to do it. At the expense of our army and treasury. To call him a "stubborn ass' is far to kind.

bonus question

4. Aren't you excited that we'll be withdrawing forces from and already understaffed Afghanistan for this surge? Won't it be great whenthe Taliban seizes control of Kandahar and we can't do anything about it because we are too busy watching the Shi'ites systematically force the Sunnis out of Baghdad? I know I am!

I tend to associate with Republicans, and I have heard the word "delusional" more often in the past three months than I have in a decade.

This has gone from farce to Twilight Zone.

"we are making progress"..."the next three month are critical"..."but thucididyes says"..."be afraid"..."islamomenace"..."freedom"
Hey it worked before!

BTW, whatever happened to the Coalition of the Willing?

My sense is that if all that is acheived is 2, then it will have been pretty worthwhile. Guerillas tend to work best when they're deeply embedded in the population. A huge part of the war effort centres on bringing the civilian population round and encouraging them to inform on/ kill the terrorists.

In addition, one of the difficulties that the US has faced is that there hasn't been enough infiltration of many islamic entities. Every time you force a group to reorganise, you help plants to become better entrenched in the structure. At the same time, when you have to move, change banks, find new caches for weapons, find out who you can trust, you're much more vulnerable to intelligence efforts to find you and trace you. The surge is coming at the same time as the US gets a whole bunch of intelligence from Somalia, too.

The South looks like it's going to be handed over more or less by the timetable. I'd be surprised if a lot of Sunnis fled there. For the most part, the people being targetted aren't going to be able to function nearly as effectively anywhere else. Perhaps they'll go to Somalia and try their luck there.

Yeah, we can't forget about Poland.

Seriously, what happened to them is that they either : (1) never contributed all that much to begin with, and thus backed out with little fanfare i.e. Costa Rica (2) loudly and publically backed out to a chorus of disdain from America's far right, i.e. Spain; or (3) are not planning to match the surge and will be withdrawing their troops over the next year i.e. England.

Luckily for us, the second largest military force presence behind the US (third largest if you want to count the Iraqi Security Forces) are the unmonitored, unregulated, and largely unsupervised Private Military Forces, i.e. Blackwater. They'll stick around as long as the checks keep clearing.

Yeah, we can't forget about Poland.

Seriously, what happened to them is that they either : (1) never contributed all that much to begin with, and thus backed out with little fanfare i.e. Costa Rica (2) loudly and publically backed out to a chorus of disdain from America's far right, i.e. Spain; or (3) are not planning to match the surge and will be withdrawing their troops over the next year i.e. England.

Luckily for us, the second largest military force presence behind the US (third largest if you want to count the Iraqi Security Forces) are the unmonitored, unregulated, and largely unsupervised Private Military Forces, i.e. Blackwater. They'll stick around as long as the checks keep clearing.

I tend to think that "to surge, or not to surge" is the wrong argument. The argument that should be taking place is, are we ready to accept that we are facing a very strong insurgency, and accordingly, implement intense counterinsurgency operations...see David Galula's "Counterinsurgency: Theory & Practice." I served in Iraq in 2004 and have little use for the "cut & run" crowd, but I am also dismayed that we have violated practically every principal of counterinsurgency warfare.

Re: point 2. If the surge could actually work (I don't think it can), I don't see the limited geography being a huge problem. I think having a nation's capital secure is hugely important both symbolically and practically. As an example, Afghanistan has problems in many parts of the country, but Kabul is secure and has many international actors working out of it.

However, we've already tried a massive concentration of forces on Baghdad and it hasn't work. So, sadly, it's a moot point.

"have little use for the "cut & run" crowd"...instead of "cut and run" they should be refered to as the "correct from the outset" crowd.

You have to hand it to the neo-cons inspite of a flawed outlook,incompetent and corrupt execution they still maintain the rhetorical high ground...as per Matt Foleys comments...I assume he is not being sarcastic.

If we were actually going to implement Patreaus' counter-insurgency model, that would be one thing. We aren't. His model, and the Kagan-Keane plan, call for substantially more troops than are actually going to be invested here. There isn't really much "plan" to this plan, as far as I can tell.

If we aren't going to seriously implement the Patreaus model, and thats the conclusion I think everyone needs to make, and the old "stay the course" model isn't working, then whats the alternative? Thats what the administration refuses to confront and deal with. The only alternative left seems to be a phased withdrawal. But, given the cut-and-run rhetoric they can't confront those real choices honestly.

"Stubborn ass?"

I think he's just waist deep in a river of blood and that's how he likes it. Bush is a brute.

I check into your blog now and again to see what sane Republicans have to say about the topics of the day. And it's telling that you have no comment. Why the hell not?

The surge is partly aimed at quelling the insurgency, but it also to provide contingency against Iran. If the U.S. or Israel decide to launch a series of airstrikes against Iranian nuclear sites (the U.S. has quietly increased its naval presence in the Persian Gulf), then Iran will strike at the U.S. in Iraq. Not with a conventional invasion, the U.S. could probably repel that. But Shiite militias in Iraq, funded by and sympathetic towards Iran, will strike back.

Hi. I read this site every day, but I hate commenting - gives me writer's block. I'm only chiming because today is De-Lurking Day.

I hate Republicans. I grew up in a 100%-Republican suburb of Columbus, Ohio, and I hated all the funny jokes about queers, athiests, scientists, Frenchmen and health-care advocates; I hated the think-of-the-children hand-wringing over the Monica Lewinsky scandal; I hated all the "earnest" debates as to what's should be "done" about black people; I hated last year's suddenly-urgent need to deal with all the Mexicans; I hated the calls to "save" the English language, to "save" Christmas; I hate listening to Bill O'Rielly complain that there's no Republican film critics; I hate the war on science (I work for Scholastic and we're not allowed to publish books mentioning evolution anymore; I used to work for McGraw-Hill and Texas forced us remove a breast-exam diagram from a health textbook); and I hate Christians— you hypocritical killers:

During the first Gulf War I was in eighth grade. We were watching a fimstrip about Middle Eastern antiquity. The section on Baghdad described the city as the oldest in the world, with some of the most-important and beautiful relics. Our teacher wisecracked, "I bet it doesn't look so beautiful now," and the whole class cracked up. Christians: the mass deaths of people isn't funny, even if the dead are your "enemies."

So... Dan, I read your blog every day. I think you are compassionate, like only a conscientious thinker can be. So... Dan, how about some soul-searching? Why the silence? Our is the issue of pouring more soldiers into Iraq somehow less important than whatever stupid tariff of the week?

I guess I'd assessed from the tone of Mr. Drezner's 3 questions that he regards the "surge" with the same derision as those of us commenting on it do. Isn't that clear, or am I taking crazy pills?

The "surge" might have been effective if it was done in secret.

To signal your plans well ahead of time to your enemies just to score some political points is...kinda dumb.

Now, every bad guy in Baghdad has either left or prepared a nice welcome for our poor troops.

A fourth question for pro-surge folks:

Suppose it doesn't work. What will you advocate then? Further escalation, or withdrawal?

Alphie, it depends on your purposes. There's a lot of Iraqis who will have been expecting an ISG style withdrawal/ compromise. Under those circumstances if you have a terrorist group in your neighbourhood, you'd be mad to come out against them too hard. If you think that you'll get enough support to defeat them, you'll be more likely to try.

When the dominant voice in the international media has been (wrongly) predicting withdrawal, as it has for a long time, that message has been killing Iraqis. Since you want to time your terrorist efforts to the patch before the occupier leaves for maximum propaganda effect, it also kills Americans. One of the best things about this approach is that it says in relatively clear terms that the US is not pulling out terribly soon. Even if the US were to pull out soon, it is better that this is not believed to be the case.

Incidentally, Alphie, if you were right and a lot of terrorists left Baghdad for more peaceful parts of the world, wouldn't that mean that Iraq could stabalise itself much, much more effectively? As for those who, under your theory, don't leave but "prepare a welcome", what makes you think that they're not "really trying" already?