# Posted 11:30 PM by Ariel David Adesnik  

UM, WHY ARE THE HAWKS SO HAPPY ABOUT POLLACK & O'HANLON? George Will is concerned. The advocates of the surge are celebrating a moderately upbeat assessment (PDF here) by Democratic security experts Michael O'Hanlon and Kenneth Pollack of the Brookings Institution. Their good news (summarized in a NYT op-ed) is that:

"We are finally getting somewhere" ("at least in military terms"), the troops' "morale is high," "civilian fatality rates are down roughly a third since the surge began" and there is "the potential to produce not necessarily 'victory' but a sustainable stability."

But then Will cites the bad news from the same op-ed:

"The situation in Iraq remains grave," fatalities "remain very high," "the dependability of Iraqi security forces over the long term remains a major question mark," "the Iraqi National Police . . . remain mostly a disaster," "Iraqi politicians of all stripes continue to dawdle and maneuver for position," it is unclear how much longer we can "wear down our forces in this mission" or how much longer Americans should "keep fighting and dying to build a new Iraq while Iraqi leaders fail to do their part," and "once we begin to downsize, important communities may not feel committed to the status quo, and Iraqi security forces may splinter along ethnic and religious lines."

According to Will, the ability of certain hawks to cite Pollack & O'Hanlon as evidence of success in Iraq demonstrates that said hawks have fallen prey to "a powerful will to believe, or disbelieve, as their serenity requires." In other words, they are no longer part of the reality-based community.

Yet it is Will himself who may have fallen prey to his own "powerful will to believe". Read the NYT op-ed for yourself and see how carefully Will had to select his quotations to make Pollack & O'Hanlon's good news seem less significant.

Even better, read the full report -- unacknowledged by Will -- that Pollack & O'Hanlon put together after their trip to Iraq. (PDF here) They write:

We found a significant improvement in the morale of American forces in Iraq compared to previous trips to Iraq. In the past, we had often found American military personnel angry and frustrated—many sensed they had the wrong strategy, were using the wrong tactics, and were risking their lives and losing their friends in pursuit of an approach that could not work.

On this trip we felt that most soldiers and Marines were confident in General Petraeus and the team he had put together. They were equally confident in the strategy and tactics Petraeus has devised, and generally could point to tangible signs that these tactics were producing results. They also felt that the surge had provided them with sufficient forces to correct problems that had plagued previous American approaches—specifically the inability to hold terrain once it was cleared (leading to the "whack-a-mole" problem) and the inability to cover significant, flanking terrain in which Iraqi militants either found sanctuary or moved personnel and weaponry.

In contrast to many critics who believed that the U.S. military (and particularly the Army) would take years to adapt proper counterinsurgency (COIN) and stabilization techniques, American forces appear to have embraced them in just a matter of months. Every division, brigade and battalion staff we met with, as well as soldiers and Marine in the field, had internalized the principles of COIN operations. More impressive still, they had also grasped one of the most important and most difficult of those, which is the need to adapt all of the other principles to specific circumstances in each locality.

We found that U.S. soldiers and Marines were applying the principles of successful COIN and stability operations to the conditions of very different provinces, cities, towns and neighborhoods with great sophistication and ingenuity. Across the force, Army and Marine units were focused first and foremost on securing the Iraqi population, working with Iraqi security units, creating new political and economic arrangements at the grass-roots level, and working to provide basic services—electricity, fuel, clean water, and sanitation—to the people. However, in each place, in keeping with good counterinsurgency practices, operations were tailored to the specific needs of the community and the leaders they were trying to help.

That is just a sample, so I encourage you again to read the full report -- including the bad news. Get the full picture. As the report says,

There is a great deal going well in Iraq but, unfortunately, also a great deal going badly. Points of view often heard in Washington, that the war is already lost on the one hand, or bound to be won if we are adequately patient on the other, seem at odds with conditions on the battlefield and throughout the country.

The battle in Washington will begin again come September. An important benchmark for honesty will be how each side represents the contents of this report.

Labels: George Will, Iraq, Kenneth Pollack, Michael O'Hanlon

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