The United States, unknowingly, has been at war with the Iranian leadership since Ayatollah Khomeini's own declaration in 1979. Iranian surrogates have for decades killed and maimed more Americans than any other asymmetrical network in the world, save al Qaida one lucky morning. People like Imad Mugniyah caused unbelievable carnage at the behest of Tehran and Damascus, and today most of these men, including Mugniyah himself, not only remain dangerous and at large but are virtually unknown across this very country. Perhaps the most lethal individual on the planet, I am still not at all that confidant that a majority in the House and Senate could properly pronounce or identify his name.

That same laxity was true with Iraq as well. We were at war with the Hussein family since the first of their seventeen ceasefire violations early last decade. Everything from the assassination attempt on a former American head-of-state, to housing the perpetrator of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, to openly calling for jihad against the West, the Ba'athist cartel in Baghdad had been mischief-making unlike any other regime in the world. There is more to the story of Iraq than simply post-2003. And al Qaida, of course, had been mutilating Westerners since Muhammad Atef, Ayman al Zawahiri, and Osama bin Laden (the lesser intelligent of the three) decided to collude. Their official call for jihad came in 1998, but their violent crusade had begun years prior.

One of the problems with counterterrorism was that it had classically been defined as a police or intelligence matter; which it undoubtedly is, in certain regards. But what if there is an abject declaration of war? It took a big bang like the monumental affront on our largest skyscrapers and most beloved cities for us to change our strategic operating principle in the Middle East. Still, to this day, it is difficult for many to comprehend how a nation-state deals with varied networks like Hezbollah, or somewhat adversarial-somewhat neutrals like Libya, or a two-faced triangulating Saudi Arabia, or unfamiliar ideological pillars of the same fanaticism such as Wahhabism or Khomeinism.

Fighting back had consisted of politically expedient (but cheap) missile-in-tent therapeutic exercises. The notion of sustained ground wars in the region, disavowing our honest broker status and siding exclusively with a liberal Tel Aviv, militarily preempting real or perceived threats, occasionally disregarding the sovereignty of a state like Yemen or Somalia, and, perhaps idealistically, promoting the notion of self-government across the Arab Levant were never seriously considered. Now these options, and all their baggage, are on the table and have been utilized.

You might be able to remember one of the more memorable late night interviews where a solemn Dan Rather spoke with David Letterman just six days after September 11. Both men held back tears as Rather spoke unusually blunt about the need to have and sustain, in his words, "firepower, willpower, and staying power." He spoke of launching a "hydra-headed operation" in over fifty countries -- "Afghanistan, Sudan, Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Libya." He had previously asked Senator McCain why the government had failed to address state-sponsored terrorism, and here was the legendary CBS anchor on national television reminding us yet again that this war "will be long," the "casualties will be greater," and "he (President Bush) makes the decisions… wherever he wants me to line up, just tell me where."

Just as Mr. Rather has since then changed his tune, so has our emphasis in the long war he so eloquently spoke of. The initial focuses were retaliatory; the original doctrine dealt with culpability and making no distinction between the perpetrators of terrorism and their sponsors. By the next summer, the issue had upgraded to preventative and preemptive measures to counter proliferation and weapons of mass destruction. The atmosphere at the time ought to be recalled; Homeland Security was still in its infancy, domestic attacks were considered imminent, and the grave and real possibility of a radiological or biological agent from the Mideast falling into the wrong hands and ending up in Chicago or St. Louis was in the back of our minds.

And yet, while these worries still linger, they no longer remain at the forefront. This war has quickly shifted into an ideological clash between modernity and theocratic regression, a geopolitical struggle to connect a part of the world our adversaries seek to culturally disconnect, a battle for the heart and soul of Islam itself. From the Horn of Africa and the Hindu Kush to ancient Mesopotamia and Southeast Asian islands, it seems to me that we are now entering the seventh phase of this war -- and this could prove to be the most important phase.

Not all of the previous six phases have been triumphant. Some were cleaner than others; indeed, it was hard to even categorize these subsequent periods of time. The first phase occurred in late 2001 during the initial retaliatory attack against the Taliban and al Qaida in the Afghan campaign. This went decidedly well and its success and unprecedented nature has been well-documented. The second and third phases occurred from January 2002 until April 2003; the former phase dealing with the year-long effort to establish counterterrorism units in the Philippines and Indonesia (and North Africa), the latter phase the mad rush to Baghdad.

Local armies in Southeast Asia have conducted counterinsurgency operations against Abu Sayyaf and Jemaah Islamiyah at the training of the U.S. military. We have lost some thirteen soldiers, but we have ensured that these two al Qaida-linked networks do not establish the transnational Islamist theocracy across the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, and Brunei that they boast to fight for. This, along with our achievements in North Africa (I will refer you to Richard Miniter's Shadow War), have been virtually unrecognized. Khadaffy Janjalani, Hambali, Jainal Antel Sali, and other terrorist leaders are now no longer with us. And of course, the initial incursion into Iraq was what truly shifted the geopolitical tectonic plates, so to speak. The invasion itself was brilliant.

Which leads to the fourth phase: the messy and perhaps unforeseen post-invasion operations against a Ba'athist guerrilla movement, the ascendancy of the Salafists in Anbar and Fallujah (culminating in the brutal killing of four Blackwater employees in April 2004), the uprising (and crushing) of the Sadrists in Najaf, the springtime offensives in Afghanistan, and the initial Pakistani assault on Waziristan. This ended in a draw. The next phase was bloodier, but, on a strategic note, more effective: the Fallujah takedown in November 2004, the Syrians out of Lebanon, elections and constitutional referendums in Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, etc., reform in Gulf sheikdoms, the massive training of Iraqi infantrymen, and fighting along Iraq's "river ratlines" against Abu Musab al Zarqawi and likeminded Sunni foreigners.

But to paraphrase Mr. Bush in his most recent State of the Union, it was in 2006 that the enemy struck back. The sixth phase of this war brought us the destruction of one of Shi'a Islam's holiest mosques by al Qaidists, igniting sectarian strife in Iraq -- which the Iranians, ever the opportunists, supported by arming and funding Muqtada al Sadr -- plus Hezbollah's initial attack on Israel, Hamas and its picking a fight, and the Islamic Courts Union (assisted by Iran, Syria, Libya, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt) in Somalia. In addition, Pakistan made a deal in Waziristan and the security situation there worsened as well. Defeat in this phase led to dramatic changes in Congress (Republican to Democrat), the Pentagon (Rumsfeld to Gates), and U.S. Central Command (Abizaid and Casey to Fallon and Petraeus).

And now we are in the middle of the seventh phase; a struggle to solidify the Iraqi and Afghan governments, to stabilize Baghdad, take on the Anbar frontier indigenously, and tackle the problem of Iranian-induced sectarianism in Iraq. This began at the urging of General David Petraeus on Valentine's Day, and early reports indicate it is going remarkably well. Iraqi bloggers and journalists write of constant red-on-red action in Anbar, where the Iraqi government has extended its sovereign control by allying with anti-al Qaida Sunni tribes. And for the first time, the U.S. has showed somewhat lukewarm commitment in going after Iranian instrumentalities across the region. We have avoided this for years and that's a shame.

General Petraeus -- the war's third commander, a tactical genius who once so successfully pacified a restless Mosul -- must be given a chance to work his magic in the capital city of Baghdad. Any war-ending proposal that does not include solidifying a secure and safe Baghdad is capitulationist and must be ignored. A Congress that unanimously approved of General Petraeus ought to give him the opportunity to implement the counterinsurgency playbook he wrote himself without the ankle-biting or imbecility of a Harry Reid. To do one and not the other is tantamount to intellectual dishonesty. Democrats and Republicans weary of Iraq won't yet cut off funds; they will, however, adjust what they say in accordance to the pulse of the battlefield, because they know, as we all do, that in our eleventh hour a contemporary and unbridled Sherman in Petraeus may arise at last.

Therefore this phase must incorporate a new regional outlook of the war, and not the kind of regional submission that wheel-and-deal types like James Baker advocate. Arresting defecting Iranian generals, nuclear scientists, and close associates of Ahmadinejad like Hassan Abbassi, Djafari Sahraoudi, and Mohammad Jaafari (and others) is good. Recognizing the new Fatah-Hamas conglomerate -- one autocratic which shuffles Palestinian funds into Swiss Bank accounts, the other the racist and murderous arm of Iran hell-bent on the insolvency of Israel -- would be bad. Cleansing the Iraqi health and interior ministries of Tehran-backed killers like Hakim Zamili is good; propping up, in a Jimmy Carteresque manner, the ruffian Hamas monstrosity would be bad. It is very clear-cut, zero-sum: Iran is weak and its leaders have begun referring to the United States as the "cobra on its tail." Trying to broker and parley this and that is all well and fine, but only from a position of strength. That cannot happen unless we allow our new generalship in Iraq and the region to carry on, ride out the surge, deploy carriers to the Gulf, rise up the rhetoric, continue international isolation, up the sanctions, and expose evidence of Iranian-made EFPs and IEDs in Iraq.

While the mullahs in Iran are at the forefront of this regional sabotage, they are not alone. We are confronted with a salad bowl-type array of nihilists who collaborate with one another stealthily. In doing this, they shamelessly use Western liberality and relativism to advance their own interests through channels of media and misinformation. Christiane Amanpour reports Iranian officials feel they are "natural allies" with the Great Satan. Speaker Pelosi dons scarves and chows humus with Assad's assassins then references American women's struggles in the chambers of Saudi male chauvinists. Useful idiots like these have normally not been helpful, but when they are beginning to partake in proactive propagandist hurtfulness they must be averted and avoided by serious thinkers and policymakers who prefer winning to losing. And winning entails dealing with the regional war within its regional context.

The Pakistani dictatorship triangulates with and appeases terrorists. This causes no goodwill but a rise in the popularity of jihadist-approved radical Pakistani clerics sympathetic to Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar. The Saudis and Egyptians, on the other hand, lock away democrats and throw away the keys just as they are also caught funding the al Qaida-linked Islamic Courts Union in Mogadishu. Taliban spokesmen brag not only of continued insurrection in Afghanistan but of sending fighters to pillage and kill in Iraq as well, even as President Karzai meets with Taliban officials to end their campaign of terror -- and these statesmen are supposed to be our friends!

Syrian agents continue to execute Lebanese innocents, U.N. investigations of this butchery stall, Tehran boasts on about its plans for the "one bomb state" (Israel), Muqtada al Sadr seeks cabinet influence (by withdrawing) even as he exiles himself and calls for the killing of Americans, and all the while the United States is pleading with Iraqis to make a decision, and fast: Are they more parliamentarian or Mafioso? Self-governance, self-defense, and self-sustaining themselves is both their and our goal, which is why a good-hearted Maliki -- who is admittedly not "our guy" -- both protects and then attacks Iranian militias, even as Iran disallows his private airline Iranian airspace in his travels to Japan for millions in energy loans we helped organize. Part of understanding asymmetrical warfare is to expect irony.

S o what must be done over the course of these next twenty months? We must constantly change tactics in order to win. Donald Rumsfeld tasked General Casey and General Abizaid with transitioning security responsibilities over to the Iraqi natives. This was a logical idea, given counterinsurgencies are usually only successful if there is helpful native participation. But our new commanders are now tasked with securing vast portions of Iraqi real estate. The terrorist-induced security deterioration in Iraq has slowed that transition and forced the U.S. military into taking on the short-term role of establishing security, alongside Iraqis, so reconciliation and economic initiative could begin.

We must make sure that we ride this seventh phase out until the end of the Bush presidency. This is unlikely given that our regional opponents are going to hit back as they have already done in 2004 and 2006. But if we first do everything in our national power to preserve the Iraqi and Afghan governments, and secondly go on the offensive against all jihadist networks and proxies of the Iranians and Syrians, and third call for the internal downfall of both the mullahcracy in Tehran and the Ba'athists in Damascus -- while assisting the dissidents and opposition forces both exiled and not exiled to get this done -- we just may actually have a shot at winning. Things have changed. Let's accept that, adapt, and move on.

Just as our own Civil War was once a conservative effort to restore the antebellum status quo, in a few short and bloody years it became a moral and revolutionary effort to destroy the socio-political and economic order of the Old South and redefine American republicanism. Soon in the future historians will come to appreciate the analogy; that sometime between 2001 and 2007 the United States embarked on a far different and ultimately more successful policy in the Middle East to offer millions of Muslim neutrals, despised minorities, and submissive women the chance at something other than a secular tyrant or the bizarre Supreme Council of Guardians -- a policy just as radically destabilizing and ethically sound as the liberation of the Helots or our own Nineteenth Amendment.