Word: kagan
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...When Kagan first proposed the enhanced U.S. operation last fall, he envisioned a larger number of troops, ferreting out al-Qaeda and troublesome militias inside the capital city in order to create what he called the space to permit the struggling factions inside Iraq to work out their differences politically. Kagan is a little alarmed now that some people expect the political issues to be resolved while the fighting continues. "The political stuff comes later," he said, perhaps not until next year, after the violence has abated...
...Kagan, who works out of a modest office at the conservative American Enterprise Institute in downtown Washington, said he continues to think that the military portion of the surge will require until the end of the year before there is enough calm to get the various Iraqi factions to begin to sort out their differences on power and revenue sharing. He called the September report to Congress by the Administration little more than a progress report...
Walking a reporter through what he believes to be the situation on the ground, Kagan unrolled two maps of greater Baghdad and delivered a before-and-after briefing on the surge. On the positive side of the ledger, Kagan said he saw three developments since the roughly 30,000 additional troops went into position in and around the Iraqi capital...
...First, Kagan claims there has been a notable shift in attitudes among Sunni factions toward the U.S. and against al-Qaeda. Kagan ticked off a number of neighborhoods where local Sunni leaders have joined forces with U.S. troops to attack al- Qaeda cells. Kagan called that development, which he said he did not foresee, "a huge thing...
...forces increased their numbers in the Iraqi capital. He noted that the trend line for violence before the surge was pointing steeply up. Now, he said, that trend has not only leveled off but has dropped. "The question before was whether the civil war could be slowed," said Kagan. "Now the question...