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It's a bizarre sight watching Vice President Joe Biden and President Obama trying to grab the credit for American success in the war in Iraq -- a war of which both were outspoken critics. It's a little like someone who's been throwing rocks at a drowning man, demanding a lifesaving medal when the man manages to swim to shore.

But now the crucial issue isn't the credit for winning the war. It's whether Obama is up to winning the peace. Simply rechristening the operations in Iraq from Iraqi Freedom to New Dawn, as Obama did this last week, won't cut it.

The terrorists in Iraq have lost or surrendered or retreated into the shadows. The various religious and ethnic factions now live in a peaceful, if uneasy, balance as the country slowly rebuilds and the oil starts to flow. The most recent elections included Iraq's first nonsectarian political parties -- a huge step forward for Iraqi democracy. All in all, this is the first peace and relative freedom the people of that country have known in nearly 40 years.

But that won't last long if a president starved for achievements lets his desire to be "the man who got us out of Iraq" override vital strategic considerations -- and not just in Iraq.

America now has 98,000 troops on the ground in Iraq, the lowest number since the 2003 invasion. The plan signed with Iraqi President Nouri al-Maliki in December calls for that number to dwindle to just 50,000 by August, when all formal combat operations by US forces will cease. Obama has also promised that all Americans will be gone by this time next year.

This is an entirely arbitrary deadline and one fraught with risks. Keeping Iraq in the "win" column is vital for US foreign policy -- and a hasty departure is the surest way to undermine that goal.

The truth is that our presence in Iraq stands as a firm anchor of stability at one end of the Persian Gulf, just as Iran at the other end represents a future of turmoil and danger. A cluster of small but important oil-producing principalities in between -- Qatar, Bahrain, Oman and the United Arab Emirates -- are watching uneasily to see if Iran dominates the region, or if a US-backed Iraq emerges as a major counterforce.

And it's not just in the Gulf that people are watching to see what happens. The US success in Iraq has been a seismic event across the Middle East. It has forced Arabs (both governments and critics) who never imagined a real democracy could take root in their backyard to revise their calculations.

It's also changed the sectarian equation of Islam. Until now, no one imagined that Shia Muslims, a despised and oppressed minority across the Middle East, could ever become co-equal partners with Sunnis -- any more than blacks and whites could share power in the Jim Crow South. Since 1979, the rulers in Tehran have insisted that the only way their fellow Shias in Saudi Arabia or Jordan or Pakistan could ever be free was to embrace a radical Islamic agenda -- and accept Iran's leadership.

Now, Iraq's Shia majority has showed a different path -- one of national reconciliation, not revolution. This has the rulers in Tehran running scared. It's why they're working hard to subvert Iraq's democratic process and manipulate its upcoming national elections.

It's also encouraged young Iranians to think that no dictatorship is forever -- as witnessed by the constant round of street protests and demonstrations against the Ahmadinejad regime.

In the wake of success in Iraq, President Obama might have adopted the protesters' cause -- democracy not only for Iraqis and Iranians, but also across the region. Instead, he has decided to turn his back on them, hoping for some ultimate deal with Iran's rulers on nuclear weapons (hopes that the International Atomic Energy Agency's latest report on Iran's bomb-making progress shows have reached the vanishing point).

Now, by withdrawing troops too quickly from Iraq, he may deal the future of freedom in the Middle East another body blow.

The peace in Iraq, like peace in most places in the world, isn't the result of signing treaties or uttering fine phrases. It's the product of a complex balance of political interests, backed up by the ultimate sanction of armed force (in this case, US troops).

The blood and sacrifice of American soldiers, sailors, Marines and airmen made this peace possible, just as they did in Europe and Asia in 1945. And history shows that the best and most lasting transitions from tyranny to democracy and from chaos to nationhood come when at least some of those troops stay -- witness Germany and Japan after World War II, and later South Korea. US garrisons and bases are a visible reminder of the price Americans are willing to pay to support our allies and deter the forces of chaos.

When our troops leave too soon, as in Vietnam in the '70s and Haiti in 1995, the results can be sickening -- and deeply harmful to our national interest.

Iraq and the Mideast now hover on a knife edge. A pullout that's too sudden, or made to look like a retreat, could be as catastrophic for the future as a nuclear-armed Iran. Right now, we need a president willing to answer to that awesome responsibility and do what's right -- instead what's politically expedient.

The future of Iraq, the hopes for peace and stability in the Persian Gulf, and the legacy of the 4,377 Americans who lost their lives in that conflict and the 31,639 wounded, deserve no less.

Arthur Herman is the author most recently of "Gandhi and Churchill: The Epic Rivalry That Destroyed an Empire and Forged Our Age," a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 2009.