Reading the article reminded me of an incident Alistair Horne recounts in A Savage War of Peace:

Two FLNA commanders are watching French Paras frisk an Algerian woman at a check point. One points out the expressions on the faces of the Algerian men waiting their turn. "My, God!" he says. "The stupid bastards are winning the war for us!"

The Paras, more specifically the authors of that policy, weren't the only "stupid bastards" winning the war for the FLNA.

(Apologies if I didn't get the story exactly right - the book's in temporary storage.)

John and tequila both point out omissions, but those don't seem to touch on the central issue. The point I took from the article is that, in Iraq today, as in Viet Nam and Algeria, we have our own "stupid bastards" intent on winning the war for AQ. And like Algeria, they aren't on the field of armed conflict, they are on the field of ideological conflict.

It makes absolutely no difference whether the drum beat of defeatism is driven by hatred of the US, greed for ratings, personnel ambitions or any of a host of base motives. The end result is the same: AQ and its allies realize that they "don't have to win, they only have to not lose" and wait us out.