Bush's B Team Takes Control Of The Strategery

Any story with a headline like New US recipe for Iraq victory has gotta be worth a look:

Rather than focus on hunting down the enemy, the US-led coalition forces should be concentrating on securing specific towns and making life so good there that no one will want to support the insurgents, Colonel Krepinevich argues.

In time, the success will spread slowly outwards as if from an "expanding oil spot" or ink blot, as happened in Malaya. "You focus on a spot segment by segment, area by area," he said.

So it's been - what? - nearly three years, and here we finally have it: a strategy for victory based on securing the oil. Not that it's always been about oil, of course!

And having thrown away billions of dollars already, the USA is going to throw even more money at the joyful Iraqis in these oil-rich focus spots. And instead of corrupt local officials creaming the money for themselves and then absconding to Syria or Iran or Brazil, as they have been to date, the locals will somehow all get a piece of it. And instead of using it to buy Kalashnikovs and bombs, as they have been, they will all buy shares in Halliburton.

And of course, this is NOT a change of course:

While not acknowledging a shift of strategy, the Bush Administration is clearly moving to adopt something close to the oil-spot concept.

And of course, Bush & Co have still NOT made any mistakes.