So, how many of us believe the Iraq Surge has "succeeded beyond our wildest dreams?"

Obama: Iraq surge exceeds expectations - MSNBC

Thurs., Sept. 4, 2008

LANCASTER, Pa. - Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama said
Thursday that the escalation of U.S. troops in Iraq, which he had opposed,
has succeeded in reducing violence "beyond our wildest dreams."

But Iraq still has failed to achieve the political reconciliation and
self-sufficiency that is required, he said, and he vowed to withdraw
American troops and end the war.

Earlier Thursday, in taping a segment for Fox's "O'Reilly Factor,"
Obama said the surge of U.S. troops has "succeeded beyond our wildest dreams."

How many after-action reports are classified (post-"surge") as self-led "AOI operations"
that are actually US Marines or special counterinsurgency forces with Iraqi army (a la ARVN) tag-alongs?

Part of the strategy of a successful counterinsurgency model advocated by Petraeus
is to infiltrate the "host country" so operations can be conducted that appear
to be driven by the host government, not by the US forces occupying the "host".

This is the successful strategy we've used in Central America and elsewhere to
make it seem like US enormous "special forces" are not occupied and occupying
around the globe in the capacity they were trained for, e.g. subversion, occupation,
targeted killings of insurgents (all of whom are labeled terrorists by organizations
like Global Security), etc.

Which is of course what we are paying them to do. The rest of the army is there
to make it seem like we are fighting a pitched battle against a supposed Al Qaeda force.

(which we strangely knew the whereabouts of and who was involved before the war began,
enough to deliberately allow them to enter Baghdad before the war began, as Kerry
pointed out, and thence track their movements, and yet strangely have not used that
info to establish any info on the real Al Qaeda in US-allied Pakistan.)

I also forgot to mention the Mahdi Army folks... could it be those folks are the
ones where the targeted killings stopped in return for a peace treaty, hence the
reduction in violence?

Are the "real terrorists" the ones who were killing 100 Americans a month a year earlier?

I thought we had Al Qaeda on the run as a RESULT of the violence in Iraq.

For that matter, are the "real terrorists" the ones who the government keeps claiming we
have successfully infiltrated, yet the organization continues to exist despite infiltration
by US operatives (like in the late 1990s when we had a mole inside the highest echelons of
Al Qaeda, and Bin Laden still had contact with his 1980s CIA handler?)
(per, I believe, Harpers Magazine)

why are we allowing this organization to stay alive -- to cause any harm at all --
if it is the "real" Al Qaeda and we have once again successfully infiltrated it?

It seems to me the Mahdi Army was causing a lot of the violence in Iraq, and the violence
subsided in 07 when we took the brakes off the "no assassination of Mahdi clerics" policy.

For all we know, Al Qaeda in Iraq is a mutually agreed upon fiction to cover up the fact
that we are paying locals not to shoot at us.

Like all those "MS 13" off-shoots that turn out to be copycat actions by local teenagers,
played up by the media in order to justify SWAT team expenditures.

Who can reasonably say that the surge stopped the violence?

Like McCain walking through the streets of Baghdad without his vest and security forces.

We can only hope that Palin is insurance for McCain in the same way it would
have benefited Obama (in this day and age) to pick someone like Clark for VP.
Someone the Powers That Be would never want to see elevated to the office of President.