THE GHOSTS OF ANBAR, PART II: A new dispatch from Michael Yon. Excerpt:

As it happens, these “police” had come from the same station that warned us about the bomb. This is one face of the political solutions we hear about in the news. The ones that are supposedly not happening. Here in Anbar, it’s working.

Some of these men will admit they were insurgents who switched sides because they realized that they are more likely to get what they want with a stable government. Al Qaeda promised them everything under the baking sun, yet al Qaeda killed people who smoked—and Iraqis like to smoke.

Read the whole thing.