The Surge- One Year In

It is now one year since the Surge has been put into effect. Senator's John McCain and Joe Lieberman, the later has endorsed John for President, by the way, have written an article in the Wall Street Journal explaining that the surge has worked:

It was exactly one year ago tonight, in a televised address to the nation, that President George W. Bush announced his fateful decision to change course in Iraq, and to send five additional U.S. combat brigades there as part of a new counterinsurgency strategy and under the command of a new general, David Petraeus.

At the time of its announcement, the so-called surge was met with deep skepticism by many Americans -- and understandably so.

After years of mismanagement of the war, many people had grave doubts about whether success in Iraq was possible. In Congress, opposition to the surge from antiwar members was swift and severe. They insisted that Iraq was already "lost," and that there was nothing left to do but accept our defeat and retreat.

In fact, they could not have been more wrong. And had we heeded their calls for retreat, Iraq today would be a country in chaos: a failed state in the heart of the Middle East, overrun by al Qaeda and Iran.

Be sure to read the rest.

Here is a short press release in addition to the WSJ article:

"A year ago today the president announced that five additional brigades would be deployed to Iraq, which Osama bin Laden's top lieutenant called a central battlefront in al Qaeda's war against us. I had long argued that a change in course in Iraq was critical to achieve success there. Today, thanks to the tremendous leadership of General Petraeus and the bravery of our troops, the surge is working.

"When the troop surge and new counterinsurgency campaign was first implemented, many politicians either outright opposed it or equivocated and hedged, but I was convinced that the new counterinsurgency plan was sound and the courage of our ground commander and his troops would prevail over the Islamist extremist enemy. Today, operations by American forces, in partnership with our Iraqi allies, have put the terrorists on the defensive, yielded significant intelligence on our enemies, and turned Iraq around from the direction it was headed. We will succeed in Iraq if we don't lose our resolve. We must not succumb to the calls of some for retreat. We will not surrender, our enemies will."