Saturday, September 01, 2007

Come September

Broder, last May:


But it is only for now. Come September, when Gen. David Petraeus, the commander in Iraq, says that he will be able to judge whether the new tactics and the nearly 30,000 additional troops have turned the tide in the effort to reduce the carnage in Baghdad, different political forces will prevail.

If he is successful and if the Iraqis begin to make the political accommodations needed to form a stable government, the president will be in a far better position to rally domestic support for the cause. If not, you can expect to see many congressional Republicans joining the Democrats in a demand for a "Plan B" that would probably lead to an early exit by a substantial portion of American troops.


Of course, that was back when "surge success" was defined as "making political progress" rather than "if we count arbitrary numbers of bodies and measure that number against arbitrary dates then we can pretend WE'RE WINNING."