Declaring victory but not going home

Just what many of us feared most: that the U.S. would quickly turn over power -- and responsibility -- to an interim government, declare "mission accomplished," and repeat the mantra that everything's going swimmingly in Iraq as they continue progress towards democracy.  And that although "facts on the ground" demonstrate something quite different, we'll hear nothing but happy talk out of Washington, and compliant editors around the country will push Iraq further and further from the front pages, much to the relief of a war-weary nation.
 
That is the argument, more or less, of Jim Hoagland's op-ed piece, "Perception Gap in Iraq."

Last Friday, Jim Krane of the Associated Press quoted unnamed U.S. military officers saying that Iraq's insurgency is led by well-armed Sunnis angry about losing power, not by foreign fighters. They number up to 20,000, not 5,000 as Washington briefers maintain, Krane added in his well-reported but generally overlooked dispatch.

The point is not 5,000 vs. 20,000. The insurgency's exact size is unknowable. The point is that enough officers in the field sense that what they see happening to their troops in Iraq is so out of sync with Washington's version that they must rely on the press to get out a realistic message. That is usually how defeat begins for expeditionary forces fighting distant insurgencies.

This could prove disastrous on at least two major fronts: 1. Iraq will continue to degenerate (and U.S. troops and Iraqis will continue to die), further inflaming the middle east and swelling al Qaeda's recruitment rolls; and, 2. with Iraq off the front page, it becomes one less thing for the Bush campaign to worry about.

Meanwhile, back in Iraq...meet the new boss, same as the old boss.