Does anyone believe that there is any mystery about what will be in the report of General David Petraeus on the troop surge in Iraq? This is the general who rose to his position as commander in Iraq through a combination of attrition and loyalty. While his predecessors in the Green Zone made the mistake of offering critical assessments of the military genius of the Bush administration, Petraeus pursued a policy of reassurance to Washington.

So why is the press constantly speculating on the general’s September report? Why does the press continue to see this as some critical and decisive decision for U.S. policy? I or you could have written this report within days of the beginning of the surge. It is a policy that can not and will not fail, even if it already has.

Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez and General George Casey found that they had lost their connections in the White House and saw their career trajectories move south, or at best, sideways. When they disagreed with the assessments of then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld or Vice President Dick Cheney, they obviously had to go. Wish-based assessments almost always trump reality based assessments, especially in politics.

Petraeus made no such mistake. He moved on his own to develop a plan for Iraq that would be ready when the White House grew desperate in the face of failure and needed a new look. The time came, the plan was given a name, and Petraeus was given command. Thus, the birth of The Surge.

Like everything else tried by this failing and flailing White House, it was yet another new and true blueprint for victory. The September report will be optimistic, as upbeat as the Bush-Petraeus photo out of Iraq today. It will find some modicum of success where American troop strength has been concentrated. It will ignore all other areas. There are a few hints that it isn’t quite yet working, but it will promise more to come — just give it more time. Maybe as much as three years, as Petraeus has suggested.

The president needs the report to be a success, and what the president needs, Petraeus delivers. As Paul Krugman points out in today’s New York Times, just six weeks before the 2004 presidential election, Petraeus wrote an op-ed published in The Washington Post claiming that there had been “tangible progress” in Iraq, and that “momentum has gathered in recent months.”

Reality-based assessments will not contradict wish-based needs. For the general to find failure would be to cast doubt on the genius of his own policy and to ring the death knell on his career trajectory.

The reality-based truth is that the war in Iraq and the surge continue to produce massive misery for the Iraqi people. Basic services are still lacking; people are living in 130-degree heat with no electricity and very limited water. Violence continues unabated. The death toll of civilians keeps on rising. The number of refugees within Iraq has reached crisis proportions, and the number of people who have left the country is now estimated at 4 million. Syria has taken in 1.2 million Iraqis, while Jordan has taken in 700,000.

Among these refugees from the misery created by this war, a war the United States chose to start and continues to pursue without prospect of resolution, are thousands of Iraqis who hitched their star to the American cause. For those still within Iraq, there are daily threats on their lives and the lives of their families. For those who have fled, there are issues of survival.

Many believe that the United States owes something to those who worked for the U.S. military and whose lives are now at risk. For all but a handful of these allies, however, there has been little or no help. The notion that the United States has any obligation to them, or that they should be allowed to flee Iraq and come to the United States, has not received serious deliberation. The Bush administration has said the United States would admit 7,000 people who put their lives in jeopardy; thus far, only 190 have been allowed in.

None of this should come as a surprise. This war was never about the Iraqi people or saving them from the terrible lives they lived under Saddam Hussein. They have never mattered, which is why nothing is being done to open the U.S. borders to them beyond a trickle.

The war was about grander things: Saving America from a nuclear threat. Disarming the madman who had weapons of mass destruction. Transforming a society into a democracy. Transforming a region. Changing the balance of power. Producing a rush to democracy. Protecting the oil supply.

It was about all sorts of wonderful things. But it was never about the Iraqi people, because if it were, they would be the focus of concern. Instead, they are left to wallow in misery in the wake of a policy failure of colossal dimensions, a policy that Ted Sorenson recently called the “the most disastrous blunder in U.S. foreign-policy history.”

But, not to worry. The surge will save everything. Or it will at least save the career of General Petraeus and hopefully fool the American people into thinking something good is now happening in Iraq, at least until next fall. After that, it will become a problem for the new Democratic president and, at present, neither he nor she seems to have any plan to disengage from disaster. Perhaps Petraeus will have a plan for them, too.