KRISTOL: Yeah, doubling the U.S. troop presence in Baghdad can make a big difference. Look, if I were a Sunni extremist and was worried, which I would be, about a doubling of U.S. forces in Baghdad, what would I do? I would try to convey an impression of chaos. I would get the biggest truck bomb possible and drive it into a market in a Shiite area. If that’s going to drive us out of Iraq, that’s just ridiculous.

That would just send a message to any place we have interests, all the most ruthless group of terrorists has to do is kill a bunch of civilians and we’re going to leave. There’s no evidence they can stand up to U.S. troops and quite a bit of evidence that they’re worried. On the whole over the last two weeks, some of the news for Iraq is slightly optimistic. It’s going to be tough, but I see nothing that persuades me that the surge can’t work quite well.