The counterinsurgency strategy was only part of the answer. The other was the surge. We've gone over this many times but you like to pretend the surge had nothing to do with it. Clearly having the troops to maintain security in an area after it was cleared out has been a huge factor in stability.

30,000 more troops using the same tactics would have done little or nothing without the new strategy.

Many high ranking generals called for a surge for years.

Name one. During the surge, we were treated to news stories about retired generals calling it a failure.

...had there been enough troops early on things would have been far different. Rumsfeld stubbornly refused because he was playing with his 'newer smaller army' game.

At the beginning, we didn't HAVE any more troops, something that continuously eludes liberal military "experts."

Now, back at the Democrats you're trying so hard to rehabilitate:

If you've got any example of a Democratic leader over the past three years calling specifically for an increase in existing troop levels to help us win, point it out. Bonus credit if you can come up with a Democratic leader telling us prior to the Bush surge announcement that we should be using Petraeus-type counterinsurgency tactics.

The current strategy is succeeding where previous ones did not, and for all the deflection you're trying to accomplish (look over there! It's Rummy!), you can't get past the simple fact that the Democrats spend the entire year of 2007 trying to make sure the surge didn't occur while continuing their other sabotage attempts in the meantime. Fortunately, they failed.

They bet the entire farm on failure, practically spitting on Petraeus as he tried to tell them what he was doing. If there is a success now (and I'm not claiming that as a sure thing), the excuses aren't going to work.