Schmedlap:

I went to Iraq to help us structure and implement our departure, which (fingers crossed) I hope we succeeded at. Gen. Petreaus proved in that instance, that COIN was a useful tool (however partially or haphazardly applied) for that withdrawal. Much of my time was, in fact, spent re-linking the effectiveness of national government to the provinces.

For all the national fretting, Gen Abdullah, Salah ad Din's Deputy Governor, is plowing ahead with his dream of an international airport in Tikrit to handle the tourists already returning. No US or national funds. I will be proud to land at that airport, which we first discussed, and organized the strategy for, in February 2008.

Several folks were killed trying to restore electricity, roads, etc... especially in and around Bayji in early 2008.

My last visit to Tikrit was for a Safe Water Working Group to, in part, restore and construct regional water systems. My last day on DoS duty, I spent on a hillside at Arlington watching services for a young soldier shot by a sniper while providing security to inspect one of those projects. Now, open.

Private First Class Christopher Lotter, a young soldier from Chester Heights, Pennsylvania, who died at age 20 on December 31, 2008 after being shot by a sniper while on patrol to inspect a water treatment plant outside Tikrit, Iraq.

If I was face-to-face with his parents today, I can honestly state that, while his death may never be explicable, the work he was doing was important, and made a real difference.

It took two months to organize the temporary replacement bridges across the Tigris at Bayji and elsewhere in the North, but the permanent ones have already opened or will soon, and have not been attacked yet. Nor, do I believe the forces that could threaten those bridges have the likely resources to do so. They would profoundly alienate a struggling post-conflict economy, and face a pretty decently organized Iraqi Army.

Last week, one of my senior advisor cohorts in Tikrit helped to organize a very successful trade and investment conference there. Very proud of him.

They have a civilian GIS mapping framework and are pushing ahead with the census. That was one of my principal responsibilities.

KRG issues have not turned into a disaster. I believe my service on the UN's disputed boundary team made a small difference in that regard.

Not every meaningful dream happens right away, and I am absolutely sure that the assurance of a functioning Iraq will come from emerging vibrance in the provinces---the national politics in Iraq, like in the US, is just one dimension of a Country's resilience.

I am very proud of our work, and very aware of all those who died or were seriously injured trying to do it.

From our little band of civilian advisors, perhaps Terry Barniche, blown up in June 2009, was the most widely covered, but there was never a time that we were not aware of the sacrifices of all the young route clearance, and patrolling soldiers that, for the most part, allowed our work to be safely accomplished.

Unlike some, I understand what we did in the surge period as very productive and successful within the limited goal of engineering our successful departure and a reasonable handoff to basically functioning civilian control.

That optimism does not extend to Afghanistan, where I have friends on the ground and am very aware of the civilian reconstruction limitations. Are they going to be able to make the kind of contributions were made in Iraq, despite multiples more hardships? I don't believe so absent substantial changes from our current set and strategy.

Afghanistan, in my opinion, will, regrettably, prove that COIN (ala Iraq) can not serve as a substitute for either quelling the materially different situation in that Country, or standing in lieu of a functional national government.

My Dad was a Royal Marines Commando (before coming to the US during the brain drain in 1960), and, among other things, travelled in the Great White Fleet (on Hood 2) after WWII. He always wanted to go through the Khyber Pass, but was prevented then, and throughout the next fifty years from taking that trip due to conflicts.

My optimism vanishes when you take the Iraq expereince and attempt to improperly apply it to Afghanistan.

I am expecting either a major course correction very soon, or both Petreaus's and McCrystal's place in US military history will not be pretty.

If somebody asks me to go to Afghanistan to get us out, or to actually tackle Afghanistan's real problems (political), I will be happy to undertake that mission as to my little skill set, but the rest is a fool's dream, playing out in an already immutable script. Small pieces of tactical successes cannot substitute for a flawed, and unimplementable strategy.