There's the war in Iraq and then there is the war over the war in Iraq. The first is about gaining ground against the sectarian militias and terrorists who plague that country. The second is about storytelling.

Advocates of staying and fighting in Iraq are at a distinct disadvantage in the second war. The burden of the Iraq fighting falls on such a small number of military families that it is easy to portray the troops in the field as victims. This has proved an effective strategy for Virginia's junior senator, Jim Webb, a staunch opponent of the surge. Once seen as an irascible loose cannon, he has used his experience in the Pentagon--he served as Ronald Reagan's assistant secretary of defense for reserve affairs and had a brief, controversial stint as secretary of the Navy--to mount a disciplined attack on the Bush administration's personnel policy, what you might call the soft underbelly of the surge.

Politically speaking, advocates of withdrawal are in a bind. Though all depends on how the question is asked, a CNN poll conducted in late April found that only a third of Americans say they want all U.S. troops out of Iraq immediately. Another third want to withdraw some troops, and a fifth want troop levels to stay where they are. Despite the general unpopularity of the Iraq war, Cindy Sheehan-esque calls for bugging out aren't popular.

In 2007, Democrats failed in efforts to pull the plug on the war by denying the military the funds it needs to keep the troops on the battlefield. This is where Webb has proven adept. Rather than try to bring the troops home directly, Webb has focused on an advocacy campaign for the troops. And if that means we can't sustain U.S. efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, so be it.

Last year, Webb sponsored an amendment that aimed to give troops more "dwell time" between deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, especially a minimum of three years for National Guard and Reserve units. The measure had an obvious appeal as the strains of increased deployments have pushed many military families to the breaking point. But, as Webb surely understood, it also would have made the surge strategy impossible. At the last minute, Webb lost a key ally, Senator John Warner, and the measure died.

This year, Webb has built a broad coalition around his generous "Post-9/11 Veterans Educational Assistance Act," designed to dramatically increase G.I. educational benefits. All told, the measure has 56 cosponsors, including Senate Republicans like Warner and Chuck Hagel and Richard Lugar. By including the measure in its $195 billion emergency war-funding package, the Democratic congressional leadership has all but dared the White House to veto it.

The case for Webb's proposal is rooted in the extraordinary success of the Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, better known as the G.I. Bill of Rights. Because men who managed to avoid the draft had made economic progress over the war years, there was a fear that veterans would have a hard time catching up--and that resentment would build. The G.I. Bill offered a generous educational benefit that gave millions of veterans a foothold in the middle class and sparked a dramatic expansion of American higher education. At the time, the benefit was more than enough to cover the then-modest cost of a college education. The military emerged as an engine of opportunity.