In Iraq, “U.S. troops on a raid in southern Salahuddin Province found the revealing diary of a regional leader of al Qaeda in Iraq [Abu Tariq]. The repeated theme of his entries in the fall of 2007 was how the flipping of the insurgency was eroding his group. ‘There were almost 600 fighters in our sector before the tribes changed course,’ he wrote [on October 15, 2007]. ‘Many of our fighters quit and some of them joined the deserters.’ Now, he said, he had ’20 or less’ fighters deemed reliable–and he wasn’t even sure about a few of those who seemed to be avoiding him.”
– Thomas E. Ricks, The Gamble, Page 210