Austin Bay Blog

Realclearpolitics.com features a summary of this morning’s testimony by General Petraeus .

Key graf:

Still, security in Iraq is better than it was when Ambassador Crocker and I reported to you last September, and it is significantly better than it was 15 months ago when Iraq was on the brink of civil war and the decision was made to deploy additional forces to Iraq.

A number of factors have contributed to the progress that has been made.

First, of course, has been the impact of increased numbers of coalition and Iraqi forces. You’re well aware of the U.S. surge. Less recognized is that Iraq has also conducted a surge, adding well over 100,000 additional soldiers and police to the ranks of its security forces in 2007 and slowly increasing its capability to deploy and employ these forces.

A second factor has been the employment of coalition and Iraqi forces in the conduct of counterinsurgency operations across the country, deployed together to safeguard the Iraqi people, to pursue Al Qaeda-Iraq, and to combat criminal elements and militia extremists, to foster local reconciliation, and to enable political and economic progress.

Another important factor has been the attitudinal shift among certain elements of the Iraqi population. Since the first Sunni Awakening in late 2006, Sunni communities in Iraq increasingly have rejected Al Qaeda-Iraq’s indiscriminate violence and extremist ideology. These communities also recognize that they could not share in Iraq’s bounty if they didn’t participate in the political arena. Over time, Awakenings have prompted tens of thousands of Iraqis, some former insurgents, to contribute to local security as so-called Sons of Iraq.

With their assistance and with relentless pursuit of Al Qaeda- Iraq, the threat posed by AQI, while still lethal and substantial, has been reduced significantly.

The recent flare-up in Basra, southern Iraq, and Baghdad underscored the importance of the cease-fire declared by Muqtada al- Sadr last fall, another factor in the overall reduction in violence.

During his opening testimony I noticed one of his charts, the Anaconda Strategy chart.

Here’s a link to all of the charts Petraeus used. The Anaconda Strategy is chart 8.

The Anaconda Chart is a complex graphic depicting an intricate, multi-dimensional war. It’s tough to describe even with a copy in front of you. However, the strategic concept behind Petraeus’ chart (titled “Anaconda Strategy versus Al Qaeda In Iraq”) is dirt simple: Squeeze and keep squeezing.

A commercial artist would certainly describe the chart as “too busy,” but war isn’t an exercise in esthetics. The Anaconda Strategy identifies six routes of attack on Al Qaeda In Iraq: (1) Kinetics (which includes combat); (2) Politics (which includes countering ethno-sectarian pressures and Iraqi political reconciliation); (3) Intelligence (operations from air recon to intel assessment); (4) Detainee Ops (includes counter-insurgency in detention facilities), (5) Non-Kinetics (education, jobs programs); and (6) Interagency.

Anaconda’s Interagency is a hodge-podge and a kludge of a category, including diplomacy, information operations, and –an interesting specificity—engagement with Syria.

On the chart these six broad routes become operations that converge upon and compress Al Qaeda’s command and control capabilities, finances, ideological appeal, safe havens, weapons, and popular support.

Generals have to operatonalize (execute) the abstraction of a strategy. Petreaus has.