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THIS IS THE fourth installment of Bob Woodward's compulsively readable chronicle of Bush at war. The third volume, "State of Denial," covered Iraq's descent into near civil war and Bush's plunge in the polls. Having cooperated with the first two volumes, the president declined to be interviewed during this grim period.

But in the present account, "The War Within," from mid-2006 to mid-2008, he is back on board, signaling a more optimistic mood and a success story to tell despite persistently low approval ratings. Just as prospects seem to be improving, the public has lost interest.

Though most of this latest account is given over to the wheel-spinning in the form of numerous reports, committee hearings, bullet-point presentations, panels, and infighting, Bush's mind-set emerges as more complex than simply being in denial. At times he does seem passive and dissociated from urgent problems, prone to thumping patriotic speeches at odds with events, and willing for his national security adviser Stephen Hadley to run the show; but he may have also been biding his time, exercising patience, and continually reassessing his options. Readers picking up the Iraq story in 2005-06, may well sympathize with a leader making the most of the lousy hand he was dealt, forgetting that he is also the dealer and owns the club.

Whether he matches the calm equanimity of a Caesar Augustus bust, as proffered by Charles Krauthammer, or has been stubbornly winging it within a narrow circle of acolytes is not likely to be settled anytime soon.

In the short run, several factors converged in late 2006 to improve prospects. Bush finally replaced Donald Rumsfeld with Robert Gates as secretary of defense and put the hands-on General Petraeus in charge of Iraq; he immediately began breaking up the various enemy groups. The brutalities of al-Qaida in Iraq had alienated much of the population; the Sunni insurgency was undergoing a less belligerent Great Awakening (facilitated, some say, by Uncle Sam's moolah); and al-Sadr's armies were observing a truce. It was LBJ's son-in-law and Virginia's former Democratic governor, Charles Robb, who first inserted the notion of a surge into the Iraq Study Group's 2006 report, which Bush would otherwise shelve. Finally, Prime Minister Maliki acted to expand his ethnic base and recognize former enemies.

So at present, there is an upswing in Iraq if not in Afghanistan, and Woodward includes the triumphal versions of both Bush and Rice before his own sober assessments.

Dan Dervin is a freelance writer living in Fredericksburg.