on the part of those either pro or con. We were not going to destroy the Army, a fourth or so of the civilian population and half the infrastructure so there was never going to be a military victory or 'win.'.

All we could hope for was and is a satisfactory outcome. I put the odds at 60:40 going in and they're, I think, in the 65:35 to 70:30 range now. Still up to the Iraqis and my guess is it'll work out okay. Certainly not to everyone's satisfaction and certainly not as soon as anyone would like. We'll just have to give it time and see.

Not sure it's really in anyone's interest to "make that happen" as rushing things in the ME tends to push them into telling you what they think you want hear -- or what they want you to hear. Neither may accord with reality. That aside from the fact I'm unsure it's our job to make that happen in any event. It's their country, we just gave them a chance to rearrange it -- with, to my mind, anyway -- no real idea what the final product would resemble. Nor did we or do we need to know.

The alternative of a precipitous withdrawal would be, I think a major error (90:10 on that ) -- however, I doubt, regardless of campaign rhetoric that we'll do that. We're gonna be there a while...