See, Go, and Befriend Iraqis
One of astonishing addresses I have ever heard in the US political community is that America will succeed in Iraq as it did in Germany and Japan after WWII.
It is just like believing that every American citizen today on a street is carrying a gun as every cowboy in the West 200 years ago was doing so.
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People act according to what they have learnt in tradition of their society. When they find their behaviors are not respected by foreigners occupying their country, they will find a cause to run for insurgency.
It is said that there were many US soldiers, among occupation forces in Japan, who befriended Japanese citizens with a kind of compassion; accordingly, no guerilla attacks were conducted on the US troops that had landed on Japan after the end of WWII.
In Germany, young US officers like Mr. Henry Kissinger, who was born in Germany, contributed reconstruction of the devastated country that had been led by a defective and malicious ideology of the Nazis for a cause of protecting their Christian and tribal society.
Apart from culture, history, and traditions, there were very important human and individual aspects in the success of US occupation of Japan and Germany after WWII. And the two countries have cooperated with the U.S. all through the age of the Cold War to the 21st century as the second and the third industrial power in the world.
(Before the WWII, the four strongest countries in the world were the U.S., the U.K., Germany, and Japan; however, before the War on Terror, Iraq did not take such a position at all.)
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Therefore, I hope US soldiers in Iraq to befriend Iraqis if they are not interested in any academic matters on Iraq.
It will make their presence in Iraq meaningful and valuable even for their lives after coming back to the States.
Sending more troops to Iraq should mean to send more American friends to Iraqi people for reconstruction of the civil-war-torn country.
"HER LIFE RETURNED"