Peters: Radical Shift in Strategy

Some advice from Ralph Peters. A lengthy piece, but worth reading.

WITH a troop surge nearly inevitable in the new year, we still lack a strategy to win in Iraq. Radical surgery on our approach is the patient's only hope - but the policy doctors in D.C. just want to up the medication.

Washington may be the unofficial capital of the world, but it's a town that thinks small. The real-and-present danger is that a desperate administration and a nervous new Congress won't imagine genuine alternatives to losing slowly or leaving.

Is Iraq hopeless? No. But the path to a positive outcome doesn't follow the traditional wisdom about what's "doable." We must think clearly and boldly, without regard to vested interests.

One thing's clear: If we can't enforce security, nothing else matters. So the wisest course of action seems obvious - except to the Washington establishment: Return to a wartime footing.

Focus exclusively on security. Concentrate on doing one thing well. Freeze all reconstruction and aid projects. Halt every program and close every office that doesn't contribute directly to pacifying Iraq.

Empty the Green Zone. Pack off the contractors. Reduce the military's overhead to those elements essential to support combat operations. Make it clear to "our" Iraqis that it's sink-or-swim time. Remove our advisers from any Iraqi unit that can operate marginally without them (and let the Iraqis do security their way without interference).

Above all, establish unity of command: Stop pretending there's a fully functional government in Baghdad, recall our ambassador until the fighting's over and make this a purely military effort until Iraq has been pacified.