ONE LAST TRY IN IRAQ

Lots of reaction to the President's speech last night:

Victor Davis Hanson, Ralph Peters, John Podhoretz, and Gerard Baker all weigh in with varying perspectives, but generally supportive of the plan.

The Democrats, of course, plan to fight the expansion, but they are not the only ones the President will have to wrestle with in order to succeed. His most difficult mission will be to convince the Maliki government to go along with the program. For months, they have resisted the idea of an increase in U.S. troop strength, as they want to assert more control over the war effort. One would hope that this inclination by the Iraqi government leaders was based on purely the idea of national sovereignty, but I suspect it is based more on the idea of sectarian solidarity. The Maliki government may simply want to get the U.S. to back them up as they wipe out the Sunni insurgency, while leaving the Shiite militias alone.

On the other hand, the most significant news of the day is not the President's speech, but this story out of Baghdad. The Maliki government is calling on the Mahdi Army to lay down its arms, or be attacked. If the Iraqi government really follows through on this, then there is real hope that victory might be achieved. If, however, this is just a ploy, with the Mahdi guys laying low, giving up some of their small arms, and waiting while the Americans blast the Sunnis to shreds, then their is no hope of achieving a stable Iraq.

My prediction? The Mahdi guys will lay low. I suspect Maliki has cut a deal with al Sadr. He will pretend to disarm, and retrain his guys from their current campaign of revenge killings and ethnic cleansing. He will allow the Iraqi Army, with American support, to enter the Sadr City neighborhoods of Baghdad. Most of the fighting will center on the Sunni insurgents, who will be severely damaged, if not completely defeated. This will bring relative calm to Baghdad, which will allow the Americans to send more troops to the Sunni province of Anbar, and allow them to smash the Sunni insurgency there. This will create the conditions for a withdrawal. Once the Americans have drawn down to a modest level, the Mahdi Army will return to its business, and the Shiites will have the dominion over Iraq that they desire. This will lead to an even more violent resumption of the insurgency by the Sunnis and, perhaps, intervention by the Saudis and others, and a counter-intervention by the Iranians. This scenario, of course, does not even begin to address what the Kurds will do in the North and how the Turks will respond.

I still foresee an eventual American declaration of victory, followed by a withdrawal, followed by chaos. It is only a matter of time.