Delusional

Los Angeles Times:

President Bush said Friday that his revised military strategy was taking hold in Iraq and "the direction of the fight is beginning to shift," even as he acknowledged "horrific" bombings that killed more than 200 people in Baghdad this week.

"So far, the operation is meeting expectations," Bush said of the boost in U.S. troops he ordered and the new focus on improving security in Baghdad neighborhoods.

Back on planet Earth, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates is once again pressuring the Iraqi "government" to, you know, begin governing. Also from the Los Angeles Times:

In the latest warning from Washington that America's patience is wearing thin, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates told Iraqi government officials Friday that they need to pass legislation aimed at easing sectarian tension before this summer, when the U.S. military will conduct a formal evaluation of its troop increase in Iraq.

Gates stopped short of announcing a deadline, but he used some of his most forthright language to date to make clear to the Iraqi government that American soldiers would not remain on Baghdad streets indefinitely. "Our commitment to Iraq is long term, but it is not a commitment to have our young men and women patrolling Iraq's streets open-endedly," Gates said.

And the Pentagon is no longer even focused on training Iraqi troops, so that they can carry they burden of fighting the insurgency.

From the McClatchy Newspapers:

Military planners have abandoned the idea that standing up Iraqi troops will enable American soldiers to start coming home soon and now believe that U.S. troops will have to defeat the insurgents and secure control of troubled provinces.

Training Iraqi troops, which had been the cornerstone of the Bush administration's Iraq policy since 2005, has dropped in priority, officials in Baghdad and Washington said.

Of course, the Pentagon denies it...

But evidence has been building for months that training Iraqi troops is no longer the focus of U.S. policy. Pentagon officials said they know of no new training resources that have been included in U.S. plans to dispatch 28,000 additional troops to Iraq. The officials spoke only on the condition of anonymity because they aren't authorized to discuss the policy shift publicly. Defense Secretary Robert Gates made no public mention of training Iraqi troops on Thursday during a visit to Iraq.