Is There a Way Out of Iraq?

Nov. 29, 2006 — -- Is there a way out? Will Iraq be in a better situation next week, next month or next year? Can an emergency summit in Jordan make a difference?

Charles Gibson reports from Amman, Jordan beginning tonight on "World News" at 6:30 p.m ET.

All eyes are on Amman as President Bush meets with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Kamel al-Maliki looking for solutions to the political and military morass in Iraq.

Prospects for the already-delayed meeting were put into further doubt when al-Maliki canceled a presummit dinner with Bush. But White House Spokesperson Dan Bartlett denied there was a snub, saying it was nothing more then a schedule change.

Even before the meetings began, ABC News had learned the Pentagon was considering essentially writing off Iraq's deadliest province for American forces, pulling U.S. troops out of Anbar, and moving them to fight what may be an even more difficult battle: the fight for Baghdad.

Professor Noah Feldman from New York University helped write the Iraqi constitution.

He said, "As Baghdad goes, so goes the nation."

But the fact that the Pentagon is considering abandoning Anbar shows the "ineffectiveness of the strategy and troop commitment to this point," Feldman said. "We have spent so much blood there."

Feldman said, "In a perfect world, I would not walk away from Anbar. But Iraq is far from a perfect world."

From the beginning of the war, Anbar province has been the heart of the Sunni insurgency, and more recently al Qaeda's main base of operations in Iraq.

But it is a place of increasing frustration to the 30,000 U.S. troops there, most of them Marines.

A recent assessment by the top Marine intelligence officer in Anbar concluded that without a massive increase in U.S. forces, the insurgency in Anbar could not be defeated militarily, a bleak assessment shared by top military commanders.

Under the plan now being considered by Joint Chiefs Chairman Peter Pace, U.S. forces would turn Anbar province over to Iraqi forces.

A senior military official told ABC News, "If we are are not going to do a better job doing what we are doing out there, what's the point of having them out there?"

The U.S. general in charge of the region, John Abizaid, told Congress: "Al-Anbar province is critical, but, more critical than al-Anbar province is Baghdad. Baghdad's the main military effort."