Clearly its easy to get several different events confused (vis'a'vis chicken or egg)... In defference to the context in which this thread grew (political volleyball) the "Surge" is commonly perceived as an increase in troops (BOG)

Was Petraeus part of the "Surge"... no but he helped develop the concept, and he sold it as a necessary capability to enable the "new" strategy - create security conditions that enable the space for Iraqi political progress.

Was the "Surge" the critical element that enabled MNC-I to string together a series of tactical successes that resulted in operational/strategic effects - near total collapse of AQI? Mostly no, some yes... Biggest factor was that MNC-I Staff evolved its thinking in terms of correctly defining the problem and developed a strategy to operate a tempo inside AQI's ability to adapt. That said, the inflow of increased combat capability was crucial to their ability to implement the strategy

"Surge" relationship to Petraeus strategy and Anbar Awakening? Anbar was first by all accounts, but then again Mosel in 2003 preceeded Anbar (tomatoo - tomatoe that's what its all about). Point is pockets and pools of smart people can arrive at similar conclusions - significance is that "Surge" strategy (secure population - JSPs - etc) became the norm rather than the exception.

These and several other related factors (see MikeF posting earlier) has led to a better situation in Iraq.

So what does it all mean? I don't know, but let me take a shot....

- III Corps (MNC-I), by virtue of others experiences and their own, got it right in terms of understanding the problem and developing an operational approach that made sense.

- GEN Petraeus and Ordierno were the right leaders at the right time

- The shift to offensive operations (really taking it to AQI, militias and other bad guys) had the same type of disorienting effect on our opponents as we tend to see in well executed conventional fights, hmmm.... might be a lesson there

- Can't do all this without adequate BOG so that oeprational commanders have the tools to implement.

I shall now return to the dark corner and shut my eyes

Live well and row