Welcome, I'm Anastasia Glova bringing you the Cato Daily Podcast.

Full and edited versions of our podcasts are available on our website at

W.W. Kato.org.

Last Tuesday, surprise visit to Baghdad by Prime Minister Tony Blair seemed to mark a turning point for the newly elected government in Iraq.

Although Blair spoke to Iraqis taking charge of their own destiny as he announced plans for withdrawal of British troops,

many questions about Iraq's future remain unanswered.

Director of Foreign Policy Studies, Chris Preble, is with us today.

In his remarks alongside Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, Blair sounded remarkably

optimistic about the ability of the new government in Iraq to take over security responsibilities from coalition

forces.

Is Blair on the right track?

Well, certainly he's optimistic and he should be or he needs to be because he recognizes how important it is for Iraqi

security forces to be able to take over to enable an eventual British withdrawal.

So he needs to be optimistic. The president was quite optimistic in a speech in

Chicago on Monday and I think this is likely to be the subject of of their

meetings here in Washington.

But at the same time, there have been a number of cases in the past, starting with the elections

in January of 2005, where the hope that a political settlement and political process would take the wind out of the sales and the

insurgency.

So far that has not happened.

Violence continues to go up in Iraq, but most people recognize how important it is for the Iraqis to

take over security and therefore I think that explains a good part of

...