Military Strategy

As their craft glides at high speed over the chilly waters behind the massive Haditha Dam, the U.S. sailors aboard Riverine Patrol Boat 13 spot a slow-moving rowboat that seems out of place. Navy Lt. Jeffrey Werby cannot immediately be sure whether the rowboat spells danger. "They could be just scrawny guys trying to make a living or fishing," says Werby, officer in charge of a four-boat squad based at the dam. "Or they could be something."

Taking note of the debate over the Iraq war in the presidential race, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff told Pentagon officials in a town hall meeting Thursday that the military must be prepared to change policy and carry out the wishes of the next president. But at a news conference afterward, Navy Adm. Michael G. Mullen cautioned against policies that include a rapid withdrawal from Iraq, saying leaving too quickly would undermine recent security gains.

The Bush administration believes a halt in troop reductions in Iraq after July is needed in part to ensure a large enough force is present to provide security for local elections, a senior administration official said Friday. By tying troop levels to Iraq's provincial elections, officials in effect established a new milestone to guide U.S. policy during President Bush's last months in office.

By many important measures, the U.S. military has reason to feel better about Iraq. Violence has declined, casualties are down, the president is touting the current strategy and the public's anguish has ebbed. But inside the Pentagon, turmoil over the war has increased. Top levels of the military leadership remain divided over war strategy and the pace of troop cuts. Tension has risen along with concern over the strain of unending cycles of deployments.

As U.S. forces are drawn further into renewed fighting, the potential for deepening chaos in Iraq is raising questions about whether the Bush administration made a wise decision or a costly miscalculation in backing an Iraqi government offensive against Shiite militias. President Bush said Friday that the offensive answered critics who have accused Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki's Shiite Muslim-dominated government of inaction and of favoritism toward Shiites.

The chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee charged Saturday that President Bush has no plan for pacifying Iraq in his last nine months in office, and intends to "muddle through and hand the problem off to his successor." Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware, who this week will preside over a long-awaited hearing on Iraq, said in the Democrats' weekly radio address that because Bush's year-old troop increase has not led Iraqi groups to settle their differences, it has been a failure.

The weeklong cavalcade that will accompany Army Gen. David H. Petraeus' return to Washington on Tuesday will look much like his pivotal visit last September: formal testimony, talk show appearances, and lots of charts and graphs. But this time, the Iraq commander's presentation to Congress collides head-on with a raging presidential campaign and two Democratic candidates demanding almost the opposite of his advice. The change could prove jarring.

For weeks now, the men in black turbans have been coming. They travel in pairs or small groups, on battered motorbikes or in dusty pickups, materializing out of the desert with Kalashnikovs and rocket launchers slung from their shoulders. With the advent of warmer weather, villagers say, Taliban fighters are filtering back from their winter shelters in Pakistan, ensconcing themselves across Afghanistan's wind-swept south.

For President Bush, creating a peaceful democracy remains the overarching U.S. goal in Iraq. Last week, he again described his vision for a "stable democracy" that can "promote our common interests in the Middle East." But in two days of exhaustive testimony before the House and Senate, the top U.S. commander in Iraq said conspicuously little about democracy in that nation. That's because, without saying so publicly, U.S. war planners have moved further from those idealistic goals.

Clerics and politicians speak in hushed tones about the names drawn up for assassination. Guards stand outside their compounds clutching assault rifles, and handguns rest on desks. No one can be trusted. All sides fear that dark times are coming to Najaf, the spiritual capital of Iraq's Shiite Muslims.