Fred Kagan and the delusional conservative mentality
When he proposed the escalation strategy in January 2007, Kagan claimed that all other competing plans would fail, including the ones suggested by the Iraq Study Group. In his presentation to the House Committee of Foreign Affairs, Kagan said that his strategy might fail too, but that it is too early to judge it or project probable results. It would be "a very grave error indeed to rush now to abandon the first strategy that offers some real prospect for success."
One is hard pressed to find anyone other than the administration and its cheerleading team who thinks Kagan's strategy has shown "some real prospect for success." Attacks in Iraq during June 2007 reached the highest daily average seen since the end of "major hostilities" in May 2003. According to Petraeus's latest latest projections, "sustainable security" won't be established in Iraq until summer of 2009, and the 2009 target date may be overly optimistic. Outgoing Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Peter Pace recently suggested that we may want to increase troop levels in Iraq even further. That would be in keeping with that fine military tradition that says if we can't prove that what we're doing is working, we should try doing more of it.
Which brings us back to Fred Kagan. How much longer should we give his "Plan for Victory" a chance to prove it won't fail? How long do we wait until it's "beyond question" that we once again "pursued a flawed approach? -- more at link.
