Iraq: With Friends Like These ...

The question is whether Bush or Maliki will get all the time they need. Sen. Gordon Smith of Oregon, another Republican who has come out as a strong critic of the surge plan, says many of his GOP colleagues who still publicly support the war effort have told him they're giving the president until the end of 2007. "Patience is not inexhaustible, and it is likely to run out this year," Smith said. The problem: the better part of the "surge" troops won't get there until the middle of 2007, leaving Maliki little time to produce.

And so Bush and Maliki are engaged in an awkward minuet with one another: each needs a partner, but they can't afford to dance too closely. As Maliki himself puts it rather clinically: "A relationship of interconnected interests has been formed between me and President Bush." While administration officials deny there is any "Plan B" if Maliki fails--if he prevents U.S. troops from going after Shia militias and Sunni insurgents equally, for instance--this is mostly to try to pump up public confidence. "Of course the administration has thought about it," says Philip Zelikow, who served as Rice's senior counselor until January. "They don't want to talk about it. They're trying to create a climate of positive expectations to replace the vicious cycle of negative expectations last year." Expectations are fine--for a time. But reality ultimately matters more, and the shape of that reality is now in the hands of Nuri al-Maliki.

With Babak Dehghanpisheh, Michael Hastings and the Iraqi staff in Baghdad and Mark Hosenball and John Barry in Washington

© 2007