After Gitmo

THESE are dark days for prosecution of the War on Terror.

The troop surge has routed al-Qaeda in Baghdad, and the measurable security improvement gives hope for stable political arrangements. Yet whether an American ally will emerge from such a settlement, if it happens, is highly questionable, and our satisfaction over the denial of a safe haven to al-Qaeda in its former Iraqi redoubts is tempered by the jihadist resurgence in Pakistan’s lawless northwest border region.