A reader writes:
Damn, Andrew, the "surge" was announced in December, apparently the "surge" troops still haven't all arrived, but you think it's cool and groovy to wait another 4 months to figure out whether what's obviously not working is really working, and of course at that point we'll *maybe* *start* to discuss whether there *maybe* could be a timeline.
And the maddening thing is that there are other options than just hop in the tanks and head home - ways of yeah, pawning off this mad scene to someone else with lots of humble pie, etc. It's only that the administration promised/was promised that we'd all be heroes in Iraq and won't let go of that pipedream until say 2009, by which time it will fully blame Dems for stabbing America in the back. So Americans hanging around will keep another Darfur from happening? (first, Darfur peasants don't have Saudi Arabia and Syria to back them - don't be so melodramatic - perhaps we'll get a good fullout civil war, but not such a one-sided cleansing, and my guess is that once each side realizes they're in a serious fire fight without Americans mediating, they'll consider other options. Or not.). We only provide political context - we're hardly stopping anything.