If You Don't Think The Surge Worked...Fuck You

Market by market, square by square, the walls are beginning to come down. The miles of hulking blast walls, ugly but effective, were installed as a central feature of the surge of American troops to stop neighbors from killing one another.

The slow dismantling of the concrete walls is the most visible sign of a fundamental change here in the Iraqi capital. The American surge strategy, which increased the number of United States troops and contributed to stability here, is drawing to a close. And a transition is under way to the almost inevitable American drawdown in 2009.

There are now more than 148,000 United States troops in Iraq, down from the peak of around 170,000 a year ago, and President Bush has accepted the military’s recommendation to remove 8,000 more by February.

Iraqis are already taking on many of the tasks the Americans once performed, raising great hopes that the country will progress on its own but also deep fears of failure.

On Oct. 1, the Sunni-dominated Awakening Movenment, widely credited with helping restore order to neighborhoods that were among the most deadly, passed from the American to the Iraqi government payroll in Baghdad. There is deep mutual mistrust between the new employer and many of its new employees, many of whom are former insurgents.

Another element of the transition, which has attracted far less notice than the Awakening transfer, is the effort by the Iraqi Army to begin turning over neighborhoods to the paramilitary National Police. In the future, its officers, too, will leave and be replaced by regular police officers.

All three moves mark a transition to an era in which Iraq’s Shiite-dominated government seeks more control over its own military and sway over America’s.

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The Perspective: All the critics can shut the fuck up. If this doesn't go to prove that the idea of the Surge put forward by John McCain and now CENTCOM Head General David Petraeus WORKED, nothing does.

This plan has allowed the Iraqi Security Force and Iraqi Police Officers to create security and peace in the majority of Iraq. Do you hear about our men and women in uniform getting killed now?

No!! Why is this? The Surge was a success and it will and has allowed us to bring our men and women home.

If you read the process of withdraw time line agreed upon by the United States and Iraq our soldiers will leave the cities in June of 2009. We will remove ALL combat troops from Iraq by the end of 2011.

Quit complaining, quit arguing. The Iraq war is almost over and everyone who says we did this for nothing doesn't look at the big picture and is a narrow minded fool.