Well, shut my mouth…
Anbar was where al-Qaeda located its attempt to turn Iraq into what it called the center of its war against the United States. By 2004 it ruled the cities of Fallujah and Ramadi; by 2006 it had declared an “Islamic emirate” in the region. Two years ago this month, The Post reported that a Marine assessment had concluded that the situation in Anbar was “dire” and that the province was “lost politically.” The turnaround since then has been a crushing blow for al-Qaeda — one that is not lessened, in its impact on the Arab Middle East, by the fact that the terrorist group did not begin operations in Anbar until after the U.S. invasion.
Very well put indeed, but let me help them along. Victory in Anbar is victory in the one place in the Middle East that should have ample cause to hate the U.S. and rise up against us. When we broke downt he Hussein dictatorship, we removed the Sunni ascendancy from its position of power, its source of wealth and prestige. We occupied its heartland, and we told them how things were going to go from here on out. And they fought us tooth and nail.
Until, that is, they began to realize that when we said, “No better friend, no worse enemy,” we were serious. That we would pull out the stops to support and protect them, or alternately that we would fight them to a standstill, and they (unlike some of our politicians) weren’t willing to bet that we’d give up and pull out. And what we protected them against was their putative savior– Al Qaeda. Lo and behold, the Sunnis of Anbar decided that they didn’t like what Al Qaeda was selling. It was too costly, too brutal, too foreign. And so our fight against the Sunnis and AQI became ours and the Sunnis’ fight against AQI. Al Zarqawi and his band of nasties were preaching to the one choir that should have been listening, and the choir tossed them out.
That is the real strategic victory: we have something to offer that is far far better than what the cavemen have to offer. We have a future to offer them, not an apocalypse; the chance for houses, lives, jobs, prosperity, not subsistence and subservience. No better friend!
The one passage I take issue with is, “A standard talking point for those who opposed the surge — including Democrats Barack Obama and Joseph R. Biden Jr. — is that success in Anbar resulted in large part from the turning of Sunni tribes against al-Qaeda, beginning before the surge. While that is true, the American casualty figures from late 2006 show that the conflict was far from won before 4,000 additional Marines were dispatched to the region in 2007.”
This is right and wrong, and leaves us with a false impression. The turning of the Sunni tribes began before the surge, but the victory culminated in the combination of carrot and stick, of friend and enemy, that coincided with the maturation of a bold economic and political development initiative, backed by the power of the troop surge. We cannot view either event without the other. The WaPo has enough smart people, like Tom Ricks, that I’m surprised they don’t get that.
Sadly, the world will never know the truth about the fight for the heart of Anbar because DoD will leave it to Hollywood to do our strategic historical documentation. I hope that someone in the 5-sided building will see the necessity to prodice a series of Capra or World-at-War like documentaries telling the story. Ramadi in 2006 was unbelievably scary, yet young Soldiers, Sailors, Airman and Marines kept mounting back into their vehicles and returning to the fight. It was an amazing and humbling sight. I pray someone with an appreciation for their efforts will tell their story on the big screen (where most Amis get their history these days).