Petraeus Facing A Tough Crowd

(National Review Online)  This column was written by the editors of National Review Online.

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Sen. Dick Durbin accuses Gen. David Petraeus of "carefully manipulating the statistics" to convince people "that violence in Iraq is decreasing and thus the surge is working." Majority Leader Harry Reid says Petraeus has "made a number of statements over the years that have not proven to be factual." Welcome to Washington, general. We hope you don't mind being called a liar.

Democrats will be courting political disaster if they make a full frontal assault on General Petraeus when he testifies about the surge today before a joint hearing of the House Armed Services and International Relations committees. Petraeus knows more about Iraq than they do; he has more credibility; and - judging by his careful statements about the surge so far - he is considerably more sober-minded.

At the very least, Democrats will attempt to overwhelm his testimony with a flurry of distressing indices drawn from other recent reports about Iraq. They will wave high and often a General Accountability Office (GAO) report judging that the Iraqi government has failed to meet 15 of 18 political, security, and economic benchmarks. In all of human history, a war has never been won by checklist. The United States Congress, however, is trying to lose one by checklist.

The benchmarks represent the best wisdom on how to make political progress in Iraq, circa about a year ago. Since then, conditions in Iraq have changed dramatically, but the GAO - always preferring to use static analysis, as our friends the supply-siders have long noted - has missed it. That's the peril of having guys with green eyeshades grade your war effort.

The report fails to take account of the extraordinary turn of the Sunni tribes in Anbar, and mentions the province only twice. This is because the GAO was given a narrow mandate - to focus only on the benchmarks - even as events on the ground made the benchmarks less relevant.

When the benchmarks were written into U.S. law, they seemed the best way to address the sources of the Sunni insurgency. With the surge and the tribal revolt, that insurgency has fractured, the bulk of it siding with us, a remainder with an al Qaeda that is increasingly on the run. This has made it possible to achieve some of the intended effects of the key political benchmarks without their being legislated by the Iraqi parliament. An amnesty law was supposed to ease Sunni fighters out of the insurgency; the tribal shift has led them from the insurgency in droves. A de-Baathification law was supposed to reintegrate Sunnis into Iraqi institutions; many of the Sunnis leaving the insurgency have been joining the Iraqi Security Forces. An oil law was supposed to spread revenue to Sunni areas; the central government has just sent $107 million in aid to Anbar. Ultimately, passing the laws is important, but in the meantime Iraq is hardly frozen in place.

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[katg21]

Democrats...PI$$ OFF!!!

[clestes-2009]

No one is discrediting Petraus. The truth is the truth. He is talking about the progress ONE PROVINCE has made and even he admits there are a bunch of strings tied to it. Those Sunni tribes have no been converted to the idea of a "unified Iraq". They are just using the US army to arm them and train them and then they will use both to attack the Shiite lead govn.

That is progress?????

After 4-1/2 years of US aid, that is all we get?? One province whose short term success can not be duplicated anywhere else because everywhere else has different circumstances???

And what is this sht about bringing troops home!! 2200 now, 4000 in Dec 3000 a month till next summer. That still leaves 130,000 there. What about them??? How long are they going to be there???? And, who the hell knows what is going to happen before next summer!!!

This is just horsesht all the way and we are expected to say, "Oh, how wonderful. We are winning."

We are not that stupid. This tale has been told before, several times and no one is believing anymore, except the few faithful.

[idlepugilist]

The general was selected because he would naturally give credibility to the enormous efforts and sacrifices from our brave soldiers in Iraq. Having said that, the President knew when this idea was conceived that the general''s comments would coincide with his own. The only exception is that we actually believe the general when he says America will be in Iraq for a long time. A painful, but refreshing change from the consistent stream of lies from our President.

[burneb]

Based on his distinguished background, I would be inclined to believe Petraeus IF he was allowed to give his honest assessment in public. And I would be thrilled for a reason to believe the situation in Iraq was improving. BUT with the track record of Bush and his administration, how can any intelligent American not drunk on Bush''s Kool-Aid believe a honest report is what we are hearing?

It''s bad enough that Petraeus has a near-impossible job getting honest reports from his own officers (remember Vietnam body counts?) but one always has to add a lot of salt to the opinion of any General reporting on his own success. White House influence is like a circuit that turns any negative current into a positive spin.

Remember what happened to Colin Powell.

[allen_osuno-19315235572502123818007317584585]

This General Petraeus is the same man that was in charge of the 190 thousand weapons that went missing. And his excuse? He didn''t want to have to fiddle with paperwork; he wanted to get the weapons into the people''s hands. Of course, by not showing a little management skills that any business would require in tracking a product, he had no way of knowing exactly who those weapons went to. But hey, what are the lives of a few servicemen and woman to him? He''s certainly not out their risking his own life on the front lines. He sends them out to die. Sound familiar?

CONSERVATIVES yell and slam their tables over the "liberals" and their supposed lack of patriotism and they IGNORE the fact that their own bankrupt ship is sinking and the CONSERVATIVE RATS like Wolfowtiz, Libby, Gonzalez, Bremmer, and Rumsfeld are jumping ship(or being pushed off!). They continue to bury their heads in their repetitive talking points and tell everyone,%u201Cpay no attention to that White House behind the curtain!%u201D FINALLY, the the vast majority of voters are wising up and know they have been burned cannot actually TRUST Bush anymore or expect him to keep his mits off of Petraeus''s report He needs to hide behind mindless support-shills who kneejerk spout his party line. He can''t face an honest debate. He
always offers bland repetition to captive audiences like the American Legion, VFW and controlled military audiences in completely controlled environments.

[imnho]

If this surge goes to long there will not be an army to fight the growing storms in Iran and Pakistan.The indivdual factions in Iraq are sooner or later going to fight it out. We should get out of there way. It will be a depressing bloody mess but it is inevatable.

GWB is willing to expend people to prevent admitting that he made a big mistake in starting a war in Iraq. That is real arroagance. It also unfair to the people who have to fight the war.

[sharncedar]

"Pretraeus facing a tough crowd! Please. The Democrats are just rice pudding. "

Posted by gangesdak at 03:15 PM : Sep 10, 2007

The Democrats are a disgusting, moldy old rice pudding that somebody pee''d in. And we are being forced to eat it by our sadistic mother, the MSM. Yum yum, rice pudding.

[mixterooney]

If Petraeus can''t take the heat, he should stay out of the kitchen. The National Review can''t deal with the fact that most of the benchmarks haven''t been met. Their answer? "Change the benchmarks, they don''t reflect the "reality on the ground". Wake up, everybody. The reality on the ground in Iraq is that the war is over and America lost. Now the only questions are: how long will the Bush administration keep denying that the war is lost; how long will the American public keep ignoring the elephant in the middle of our culture; and how many troops will die in the meantime?

[libsluvsuvs]

1. you must be asleep when Bush declared war on terrorism. again..and again and again..what do you need?? another Micheal Moore movie to tell you that??

2. Hussein left a massive vacumm in terms of power and control in Iraq..I am sure that you would be the same person who would "whine" that we left too soon.

3. Osama, Iran, Syria and the DNC does not want our military in there..*do I have to say more?*

4. Expanding our resources?? Pulling our troops out of middle east DOES NOT CONSITUTE A ''BIGGER PICTURE'' but a cheap escape from our responsibilites.

5. Osama bin laden is reduced to a symbol..unable to lead his own crusade..more likely wiping his arse with bark and eating worms. since you like looking at the bigger picture..picture hiding in country with billions of muslim fanatics willing to hide you??and on top of that,,morons like you who impeads any effort or tactics to get tough on these people. we need to maintain a 100% military intel on this..intel that you and your precious DNC and liberal media seems to demonize as a violation of rights..should we try you approach?? "oh osama please come out..I got a cookie for you??"

PATHETIC!!

[libsluvsuvs]

THAT IS NOT WHAT OSAMA AND THE DNC WANTS TO HEAR!!