al-Qaeda’s days in Iraq are numbered. Due their brutality and bloodlust they have made an enemy of not only the US, not only the democratically elected Iraqi government, but also of the local tribes of Iraq, especially the Sunni tribes who are not rising up against al-Qaeda and supporting the Iraqi government in ever growing numbers. The tide has grown to the point even the NY Times cannot dismiss the sea change rolling over Iraq:

Capt. Ben Richards had been battling insurgents from Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia for three weeks when he received an unexpected visitor.

Abu Ali walked into the Americans’ battle-scarred combat outpost with an unusual proposal: the community leader was worried about the insurgents, and wanted the soldiers’ help in taking them on.

The April 7 meeting was the beginning of a new alliance and, American commanders hope, a portent of what is to come in the bitterly contested Diyala Province.

Using his Iraqi partners to pick out the insurgents and uncover the bombs they had seeded along the cratered roads, Captain Richards’s soldiers soon apprehended more than 100 militants, including several low-level emirs. The Iraqis called themselves the Local Committee; Captain Richards dubbed them the Kit Carson scouts.

“It is the only way that we can keep Al Qaeda out,” said Captain Richards, who operates from a former Iraqi police station in the Buhritz sector of the city that still bears the sooty streaks from the day militants set it aflame last year.

al-Qaeda lost Anbar Province about 6 months ago, and now is losing Diyala Province – which is their last major foothold in Iraq. And we have not only our military to thank for this turn of events, we have the age old choice between oppression and freedom:

Many Sunnis, for their part, are less inclined to see the soldiers as occupiers now that it is clear that American troop reductions are all but inevitable, and they are more concerned with strengthening their ability to fend off threats from Sunni jihadists and Shiite militias. In a surprising twist, the jihadists — the Americans’ most ardent foes — made the new strategy possible. Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, a predominantly Iraqi organization with a small but significant foreign component, severely overplayed its hand, spawning resentment by many residents and other insurgent groups.

Imposing a severe version of Islamic law, the group installed its own clerics, established an Islamic court and banned the sale of cigarettes, which even this week were nowhere to be found in the humble shops in western Baquba to the consternation of patrolling Iraqi troops.

al-Qaeda is what it is – a bloodthirsty Islamo Fascist sect which believes harsh oppression of the masses is the only way to guide humanity to a promised land. Thankfully the masses always outnumber the viscous visionaries and tend to take things into their own hands. One result of al-Qaeda’s mistake was the massive increase in the Iraqi forces, now on the verge of a massive increase in resources:

Officials said U.S. military training programs were churning out thousands of Iraq Army recruits, Middle East Newsline reported. They said that by early July, at least 10,000 newly-trained recruits would enter service.

“In the next two weeks, some 10,000 new soldiers will join their Iraqi brothers in the ranks of Iraq’s army,” U.S. military spokesman Brig. Gen. Kevin Bergner said. “And the prime minister is also looking at options to further expand the size of the Iraqi security forces to meet the requirements both today and into the future.”

Ten thousand new forces in one month is a huge increase, and many of these are coming from the Sunni tribes ready to show al-Qaeda the border. And we also see something else – a surge of patriotism for America, as hundreds take the vow of citizenship as Americans as they risk life and limb in her defense. It is amazing what can happen when a simple choice is provided: oppression or freedom. Americans made that choice over 200 years ago and the world still marvels, and is irritated, in how that choice made us the most powerful nation in human history. And still, we are a simple people with simple desires. That is the magic of the shining city on the hill.