Five Simple Questions About Iraq

1.) Hasn’t the al Qaida terrorist insurgency inside Iraq facilitated the progress we’re now seeing in Sunni areas of Anbar province?

2.) Did al Qaida’s thuggery motivate Sunni tribes, otherwise predisposed to support an Iraqi insurgency, to begin working with the central government and coalition forces?

3.) Had Bush been “competent” enough to send “sufficient” US troops to Iraq to prevent the al Qaida insurgency, as many hawkish critics claim, isn’t it possible too that no number of US troops could have been sufficient to suppress militarily the domestic Iraqi insurgency, as many of his dovish critics claim?

4.) Could “more troops” have simply resulted in more US casualties, while the niceties of our rules of engagement failed to provide the brutal impetus that is now fostering Sunni cooperation?

5.) Is it possible that Bush’s supposed incompetence has done what nobody expected: brought Arab Sunni tribes in Iraq to the negotiating table and placed them at the forefront of the worldwide battle against al Qaida?