Thirty-two days ago, when defeat in Iraq was the pessimist meme of choice, I said, "A lot of people in Iraq are scared. But I have a feeling among those most worried are the various strains of thugs who are beginning to realize the folly of their overconfidence — lost in the orgy of slaughter, they bet everything in a contest they can't possibly win. Strategic vacuity is our enemies' Achilles' Heel, and our forces had best exploit it."

Now, the two groups attempting insurrections — the Iranian-backed Shiite terrorists led by Muqtada al-Sadr and the Ba'athist-led thugs in Fallujah — are unable to declare much more than empty threats. As the Marine Corps made clear in Fallujah, insurgents were utterly outmatched and their position in the Golan neighborhood stood at the mercy of an American initiative. Whatever reprieve the Ba'athists gained after days of heavy losses began — and thus can end — at our forces' choosing. Al-Sadr's ragtag "Mahdi Army" has been losing men in double-digits, facing attrition not only from Americans but Iraqis in Najaf, apparently meting vigilante justice out to the mob who would take liberty from them. Slowly, carefully, these enemies are losing.

Securing Iraq — to a point where only borders and wastelands are considered unsafe, the best we could expect for a country surrounded by hostile regimes — is far from complete. Given what has been accomplished after one year, I would consider eighteen months to two years a minimum amount of time necessary for Western military might and emerging Iraqi common good and civil enforcement to grind Ba'athist holdovers and in-country foreign terrorists into the ground. But the two objectives of 2004's Bloody April — capturing Iraqi support in the confusion and shocking Americans into panic and retreat — were not met. Politically, strategically and especially tactically, the Khomeinist-Ba'athist offensive failed. As I said yesterday, "The threat of terrorism and dictatorship feeds like any other evil, reliant on the weakness and failure of free will." American confidence, shaken by April and again in May with Abu Ghraib, is still strong, perhaps surprisingly so; if it holds, the measured ascension of a free and peaceful Iraq will be unstoppable.

IRAQIS IN NAJAF ARE PROTESTING: Against al-Sadr. Via IP, who links to a report stating that the wannabe cleric is suing for terms. What was that about Iraqis not able to cut it democratically? It seems President Bush isn't the only one being "misunderestimated." For all those who felt it was time to break loose: help yourselves, you've earned it.

KEEPING 'DIE' IN THE 'NEVER SAY' COLUMN: Just received an e-mail from Craig Brett, to whose weblog IP linked this morning, with the simple message of "we think alike." Indeed we do. About the same time Wretchard the Cat corrected assertions (or, who knows, accusations) of his "optimism," I began to think about my own. Why invest my time, most of this weblog, in the idea that Afghanistan, Iraq and the greater Near East will be free? And ultimately the world? I say that those things can be near-certain but I know enough to leave fate to the hands weaving it. America fights this war because we've seen a glimpse of doom. [One of the worst lessons the Me Generation learned from Vietnam was that foreign strife was too far away for conscience, that as soon as the television was switched off, Saigon stopped burning.] So then — why? As Wretchard put it, I haven't anything to lose. Why bet against good people — the idea that all honest men, everywhere in the world, want the same out of life? Even one glance a day at Iraqi and Iranian weblogs shows people separated not in heart, only by distance. If there is a pleasure in correctly predicting the failure of good causes that is not misanthropy, I don't know of it.