December 18, to visit Iraq.
Two days before Christmas, Bob came to see me at Camp David. He told me he had visited with Maliki, who had refined his plan for an Iraqi surge to match ours. Maliki would declare martial law, deploy three additional Iraqi brigades to Baghdad, appoint a military governor, and name two deputy commanders with free rein to go after extremists of any sectarian background. Bob had also decided on his recommendation for a new commander. It would be General David Petraeus. We agreed to nominate General Casey for a promotion to Army chief of staff. George had a long and distinguished record of service, and his experience would benefit the Army. I also wanted to make clear that I did not blame him for the problems in Iraq.
The final question to resolve was the size of the surge. Some in the military proposed that we commit two additional brigades initially—a mini-surge of about ten thousand troops—with the possibility of sending up to three more brigades later. Pete Pace reported that General Petraeus and General Ray Odierno, the number-two commander in Iraq, wanted all five brigades committed up front.
If our commanders on the ground wanted the full force, they would get it. I decided to send five brigades to Baghdad, plus two additional Marine battalions to Anbar Province. We would embed our troops in Iraqi formations, so that we could mentor the Iraqis on the battlefield and prepare the Iraqis to take more responsibility after the surge. Finally, I would accept three key recommendations from the Joint Chiefs. Condi would lead a surge in civilian resources. I would obtain public assurances from Prime Minister Maliki about our troops’ freedom to maneuver. And I would call on Congress to increase the size of the Army and Marine Corps by ninety thousand forces.
On January 4, 2007, I held a secure videoconference with Maliki. “A lot of people here don’t think we can succeed. I do,” I told him. “I’ll put my neck out if you put out yours.” Two days later, he addressed the Iraqi people and signaled his commitment to the surge. “The Baghdad security plan will not provide a safe haven for any outlaws, regardless of sectarian or political affiliation,” he said.
The decision had been tough, but I was confident that I had made it the right way. I had gathered facts and opinions from people inside and outside the administration. I had challenged assumptions and weighed all the options carefully. I knew the surge would be unpopular in the short term. But while many in Washington had given up on the prospect of victory in Iraq, I had not.
At nine o’clock on the evening of January 10, 2007, I stepped before the cameras in the White House Library. “The situation in Iraq is unacceptable to the American people—and it is unacceptable to me,” I said. “Our troops in Iraq have fought bravely. They have done everything we have asked them to do. Where mistakes have been made, the responsibility rests with me.
“It is clear that we need to change our strategy in Iraq. … So I’ve committed more than twenty thousand additional American troops to Iraq. The vast majority of them—five brigades—will be deployed to Baghdad.”
The reaction was swift and one-sided. “I don’t believe an expansion of twenty thousand troops in Iraq will solve the problems,” one senator said. “I do not believe that sending more troops to Iraq is the answer,” said another. A third pronounced it “the most dangerous foreign policy blunder in this country since Vietnam.” And those were just the Republicans.
The left was even more outspoken. One freshman senator predicted that the surge would not “solve the sectarian violence there. In fact, I think it will do the reverse.” Capturing the view of most of his colleagues, a
Condi, Bob Gates, and Pete Pace testified on Capitol Hill the day after I announced the surge. The questioning was brutal from both sides of the aisle. “This is the craziest, dumbest plan I’ve ever seen or heard of in my life,” one Democratic congressman told General Pace. “I’ve gone along with the president on this, and I bought into his dream,” a Republican senator told Condi. “At this stage of the game, I just don’t think it’s going to happen.” Afterward Condi came to see me in the Oval Office. “We’ve got a tough sell on this, Mr. President,” she said.
Amid the near-universal skepticism, a few brave souls defended the surge. Foremost among them were Senator Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, a lifelong Democrat who had been cast aside by his party for supporting the war; Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a member of the Air Force Reserves; and Senator John McCain of Arizona.
McCain and I had a complex relationship. We had competed against each other in 2000, and we had disagreed on issues from tax cuts to Medicare reform to terrorist interrogation. Yet he had campaigned hard for me in 2004, and I knew he planned to run for president in 2008. The surge gave him a chance to create distance between us, but he didn’t take it. He had been a longtime advocate of more troops in Iraq, and he supported the new strategy wholeheartedly. “I cannot guarantee success,” he said. “But I can guarantee failure if we don’t adopt this new strategy.”
The most persuasive advocate of the surge was General Petraeus. As the author of the Army’s counterinsurgency manual, he was the undisputed authority on the strategy he would lead. His intellect, competitiveness, and work ethic were well known. On one of his visits home, I invited the general to mountain bike with me at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. He was mainly a runner, but he had enough confidence to accept the challenge. He held his own with the experienced riders of the presidential peloton.
After the ride, I stepped inside a building at Fort Belvoir to take a call from the prime minister of Japan. I heard a noise in the background. I peeked out the door and saw Petraeus leading the peloton through a series of post-ride push-ups and crunches.
Petraeus’s rise had attracted some resentment. I had heard gossip from several people warning that he had an outsize ego. Back in 2004, when Petraeus was leading the effort to train Iraqi security forces,
Petraeus’s confirmation hearings came late in January. “I think that at this point in Baghdad the population just wants to be secure,” he said. “And truthfully, they don’t care who does it.” When John McCain pressed him on whether the mission could succeed without more troops, General Petraeus answered, “No, sir.” The Senate confirmed him, 81 to 0.
I called the general to the Oval Office to congratulate him on the vote. Dick Cheney, Bob Gates, Pete Pace, and other members of the national security team were there to wish him well. “I’d like a moment alone with my commander,” I said.
As the team filed out, I assured General Petraeus that I had confidence in him and that he could have my ear anytime. At the end of the meeting I said, “This is it. We’re doubling down.”
As he walked out the door, he replied, “Mr. President, I think it’s more like all in.”
On February 10, 2007, David Petraeus took command in Baghdad. His task was as daunting as any American commander had faced in decades. As he told his troops on his first day, “The situation in Iraq is exceedingly challenging, the stakes are very high, the way ahead will be hard and there undoubtedly will be many tough days.” He continued: “However, hard is not hopeless. These tasks are achievable; this mission is doable.”
As our surge troops flowed into Iraq, Generals Petraeus and Odierno relocated our forces from bases on the outskirts of Baghdad to small outposts inside the city. Our troops lived alongside Iraqi security forces and patrolled the city on foot, instead of inside armored Humvees. As they entered enemy strongholds for the first time, the extremists fought back. We lost 81 troops in February, 81 in March, 104 in April, 126 in May, and 101 in June—the first time in the war we had faced triple-digit losses three months in a row. The casualties were agonizing. But something felt different in 2007: America was on offense again.
General Petraeus drew my attention to an interesting metric of progress: the number of intelligence tips from Iraqi residents. In the past, Iraqis had feared retribution from insurgents or death squads for cooperating with our forces. But as security improved, the number of tips grew from about 12,500 in February to almost 25,000 in May. Our troops and intelligence operators used the tips to take insurgents and weapons off the street. The counterinsurgency strategy was working: We were winning over the people by providing what they needed most, security.
We followed up the clearing and holding with building, thanks in large part to the civilian surge led by Ambassador Ryan Crocker. I first met Ryan in Pakistan, where he was serving as ambassador, during my visit in
