Bush makes a surprise visit to Iraq

He's meeting with Sunni tribal sheiks and Iraqi leaders. This is a smart move, he is going to have first hand information about the effectiveness of his military plan. If it's not working, he will hear about it in these meetings. When he makes his decision, it will be based on what's going on in Iraq, not what is politically expedient to do.

On the eve of major administration decisions on U.S. strategy in Iraq, President Bush, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and top U.S. military leaders including the senior U.S. commander in Iraq, Army Gen. David Petreaus, arrived here Monday on a surprise visit for a series of unprecedented meetings with top Iraqi leaders and Sunni tribal sheiks in Anbar Province, where progress has dramatically lowered attacks in what a year ago was Iraq's most violent region.

Bush -- along with Gates, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Peter Pace and U.S. Middle East commander Adm. William Fallon -- will meet first with Petraeus and U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker, and then with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and other senior Iraqi leaders and Anbar tribal sheiks.

"This will be the last big gathering of the president's advisors and Iraqi leaders before the president makes his decisions on the way forward," said Geoff Morrell, Pentagon spokesperson. "He's assembled his war council, and they are all convening with Iraqi leaders to discuss the way forward."

The series of meetings over several hours at the sprawling U.S. military base 120 miles northwest of Baghdad will be "instrumental" in Bush's making decisions on the way ahead in Iraq, said a senior defense official traveling with Gates, who arrived at Al Asad on a C-17 shortly before Bush.

"This may be the president's last chance to meet face to face with Gen Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker before they testify on Iraq, and to meet face to face with Iraqi leaders to discuss the way forward," said Morrell.

The article goes on to talk about the turnaround in Anbar and how the Sunnis in that region have been used in other parts of the country (including Baghdad)to serve in the police and military. The US plans to bring about reconciliation between the Sunnis of Anbar and the Maliki government.

"This needs to be an Iraqi process to connect the top-down reconciliation to the bottom-up reconciliation," the senior official said. He said a major goal is to solidify the gains in Anbar through holding provincial elections and speeding the flow of financial and other resources from the central government. "One of the great concerns that we have is that this not be a temporary marriage of convenience," he said.