Which one they chose

When I heard the word "surge" - particularly the higher guesstimates - I said, "How do they think they're going to do that without a draft?"

Now we know. Not a draft - a back-door draft. As Robert Burns of the AP reported yesterday (emphasis mine):

The Pentagon has abandoned its limit on the time a citizen-soldier can be required to serve on active duty, officials said Thursday....Until now, the Pentagon's policy on the Guard or Reserve was that members' cumulative time on active duty for the Iraq or Afghan wars could not exceed 24 months. That cumulative limit is now lifted; the remaining limit is on the length of any single mobilization, which may not exceed 24 consecutive months, Pace said.

In other words, a citizen-soldier could be mobilized for a 24-month stretch in Iraq or Afghanistan, then demobilized and allowed to return to civilian life, only to be mobilized a second time for as much as an additional 24 months. In practice, Pace said, the Pentagon intends to limit all future mobilizations to 12 months.

Members of the Guard combat brigades that have served in Iraq in recent years spent 18 months on active duty — about six months in pre-deployment training in the United States, followed by about 12 months in Iraq. Under the old policy, they could not be sent back to Iraq because their cumulative time on active duty would exceed 24 months. Now that cumulative limit has been lifted, giving the Pentagon more flexibility....

Defense Secretary Robert Gates, appearing with Pace, announced several other changes in Guard and Reserve policy:

Although the Pentagon's goal is to mobilize Guard and Reserve units no more frequently than one year out of six, the demands of wartime will require calling up some units more often than that. They provided no details on how many units would be remobilized at the faster pace or when that would begin to happen.

Army officials had been saying for some time that more frequent mobilizations were necessary because the active-duty force is being stretched too thin. Gates' announcement is the first confirmation of the change...

Extra pay will be provided for Guard and Reserve troops who are required to mobilize more than once in six years; active-duty troops who get less than two years between overseas deployments also will get extra pay. Details were not provided.

Military commanders will review their administration of a hardship waiver program "to ensure that they have properly taken into account exceptional circumstances facing military families of deployed service members."

He also notes that

The Pentagon also announced it is proposing to Congress that the size of the Army be increased by 65,000, to 547,000 and that the Marine Corps, the smallest of the services, grow by 27,000, to 202,000, over the next five years. No cost estimate was provided, but officials said it would be at least several billion dollars.

So now we know. Once again, we're going to fight "the decisive ideological struggle of our time" with overburdened National Guardsmen and Reservists who never signed up for this, and with regulars who are being asked to bleed and die and be maimed for life for a little extra combat pay, and no sacrifice from those not immediately connected to the war - not even an extra tax on gasoline to supply them with the equipment they still so desperately need.

In his speech, Bush said: "Our troops in Iraq have fought bravely. They have done everything we have asked them to do."

So now, he's going to ask them to do even more. And only them.