Surgemania: Four takes on sending more troops to Iraq
Allahpundit
Abizaid and Casey say no. A group of troops who met with Gates earlier today in Baghdad say yes. Take advantage of the slow Christmas season news day that’s shaping up and read these four pieces on the subject. None is very long.
1. Mario Loyola: no surge. Why force more troops on generals who insist they don’t need them? All we’ll end up doing is antagonizing Iraqis who are already hostile to occupation. ...
2. Time: surge in Baghdad, not Anbar. It could work in Baghdad. It’s worked before:
In areas where U.S. troops control traffic through checkpoints and mount regular patrols, sectarian murders tend to drop. ...
3. Reuel Marc Gerecht: never mind the surge — fight smart. If you have time to read only one, read this one. It’s Cheney’s “side with the Shiites” strategy, essentially. ...
4. Fred Kaplan: if we surge, it shouldn’t be a Kagan-Keane surge. The number of troops we’d need just isn’t there, he says. ...
Update: Okay, make it five pieces you should read. Stanley Kurtz responds at the Corner to Loyola’s politics-before-war solution and finds it wanting for the same reason I do — if the state has no monopoly of force, its policies mean nothing in practice. He also says this about Gerecht’s op-ed: ...
