Fighting in cities is a totally different endeavor than obviously fighting out in the open.

The president and I sat down in the Oval Office, and he expressed very clearly that what he wants from me is my best professional military advice.

Items of interest will be located, identified, monitored, and remotely controlled through technologies such as radio-frequency identification, sensor networks, tiny embedded servers, and energy harvesters - all connected to the next-generation internet using abundant, low-cost, and high-power computing.

Even the Interior Ministry in Riyadh was hit. Since then, the Saudis have employed a very intelligent and comprehensive approach to counter al-Qaida, including precise operations based on good intelligence, changes in their corrections facilities, superb strategic communications programs and a host of other initiatives - all of which, together, have helped Saudi Arabia achieve impressive results in their fight against extremists.

The question is always how you get the number of troops needed. They do not have to be coalition forces. We also have to expand the training program for the Afghan National Army and the national police, in particular. and Defense Secretary Robert Gates has already announced support for a significant increase in the Afghan army.

The Sunni Arabs began to realize that they had made a huge mistake by not voting in the election of 2005 and by not being part of the new Iraq. They had reasons for this: They were effected by the disestablishment of the military and by de-Baathification (the dismantling of Saddam Hussein's party) in winter 2007-2007. They increasingly recognized that their future lay in being part of the solution rather than a continuing part of the problem.

I am not a politician, and I will never be, and I say that with absolute conviction.