Bush Move Contrary To Iraq Study Group

It's almost midnight on the left coast, and I await yet-another-forecast-snowfall and ponder Wednesday's speech on Iraq. The blogs and media space are full of stories about the "surge" in troops.

But I keep thinking of the Iraq Study Group Report, circa December 2006, page 30 (emphasis added):

Sustained increases in U.S. troop levels would not solve the fundamental cause of violence in Iraq, which is the absence of national reconciliation. A senior American general told us that adding U.S. troops might temporarily help limit violence in a highly localized area. However, past experience indicates that the violence would simply rekindle as soon as U.S. forces are moved to another area. As another American general told us, if the Iraqi government does not make political progress, “all the troops in the world will not provide security.” Meanwhile, America’s military capacity is stretched thin: we do not have the troops or equipment to make a substantial, sustained increase in our troop presence. Increased deployments to Iraq would also necessarily hamper our ability to provide adequate resources for our efforts in Afghanistan or respond to crises around the world.

Two pages later, group outlines a high-level plan - heavy on diplomacy within the region - that should succeed and allow for a "reduction in the U.S. presence in Iraq over time."

However, if President Bush is searching for justification for this troop build-up in the document, perhaps he has grasped at this sentence (which I don't read as "send in more troops" but it does talk about "power"): "Externally, the United States should immediately begin to employ all elements of American power to construct a regional mechanism that can support, rather than retard, progress in Iraq."

We have guns in Afghanistan and Iraq and now guns in Somalia. We have civilians guarding military ships and training military personnel.

Overwhelmingly, Americans oppose sending more troops to Iraq. Why, then, is this course of action even an option?

Who in Congress -- Republican and Democrat -- is going to stand up to this President, reflecting the wishes of those who sent them to Washington?

Also, see Who Will the President Listen to on Iraq: Congress or Laura & Barney the Dog?, Why Bush Needs Congress on New Iraq War Strategy, Newly Released Documents Detail Detainee Abuse at Guantanamo

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