Future military historians may end up studying and quoting Gen. David Petraeus nearly as much as they do T. E. Lawrence. And those who dig a little deeper may also study Gen. Jack Keane.
Gen. Keane wants to make sure people understand why the surge worked. “I have a theory” about the unexpectedly fast turnaround, he says. “Whether they be Sunni, Shia or Kurd, anyone who was being touched by that war after four years was fed up with it. And I think once a solution was being provided, once they saw the Americans were truly willing to take risks and die to protect their women and children and their way of life, they decided one, to protect the Americans, and two, to turn in the enemies that were around them who were intimidating and terrorizing them; that gave them the courage to do it.”