Combat role not shrinking with force

[CommunityEditor]

If, as expected, President Bush cuts the number of U.S. combat brigades in Iraq by 25 percent by next summer, that will not necessarily mean less fighting for the troops who remain.

Their numbers may shrink, but their role will not.

The Americans are likely to perform the same mission — leading the fight against the insurgency — at least through next year, in part because Iraq’s army is nowhere near being ready to take over that job.

And although parts of the insurgency took a beating this summer in parts of Baghdad where extra U.S. troops began operating, the militants have shown they are too much for the Iraqis to handle on their own.

Eventually, if the hopes of U.S. commanders pan out, there will be a transition in the U.S. military’s role from leading the fight to backing up the Iraqis as they assume the lead. But in the meantime — probably until the current force of 168,000 U.S. troops shrinks below 100,000 — the American role will be a combination of securing the Iraqi population, training Iraqi forces and targeting terrorists.

That’s not welcome news for war critics in Congress who have pressed for a quick transition from combat to support. Others, including an independent commission headed by retired Marine Gen. James Jones, call for shifting the mission away from combat to put more focus on securing Iraqi’s borders with Iran and Syria.

As he reiterated in a second day of congressional testimony Tuesday, the top commander in Iraq, Army Gen. David Petraeus, sees a long road ahead in Iraq and is leery of handing off combat responsibilities too quickly to Iraqi security forces.

At some undefined point in the future, Petraeus would have U.S. forces performing what he calls an “overwatch” role, with the Iraqis handling all security operations and the Americans in essentially a backup role. He did not predict when that would come about, but it sounded like he was thinking in terms of several years.

“A premature drawdown of our forces would likely have devastating consequences,” he told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He also cited a U.S. intelligence assessment that “a rapid withdrawal would result in the further release of the strong centrifugal forces in Iraq and produce a number of dangerous results, including a high risk of disintegration of the Iraqi security forces” and higher levels of violence.

Petraeus believes the main mission must remain what he calls “securing the population.” That is the centerpiece of the counterinsurgency strategy he began implementing when he took command in Baghdad in February. That means keeping U.S. troops inside Baghdad neighborhoods, along sectarian fault lines.

Stephen Biddle, a military expert at the Council on Foreign Relations, said in a telephone interview that Petraeus appears determined to keep his main focus on the counterinsurgency fight, even as U.S. troop numbers dip.

“My guess is that for the next year or so there’s probably not much difference” in how the U.S. fights the war, Biddle said. “We would continue to be providing a lot of population security in Baghdad” because Petraeus and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker both believe it’s not impossible to get the Iraqi central government to move toward a grand political settlement — “it’s just slow.”


Article: http://www.militarytimes.com/news/20...atrole_070912/

[The Universal Curmudgeon_guest]

Originally Posted by CommunityEditor

If, as expected, President Bush cuts the number of U.S. combat brigades in Iraq by 25 percent by next summer, that will not necessarily mean less fighting for the troops who remain.

Their numbers may shrink, but their role will not.

Read as "In an effort to buy votes from the unthinking, Mr. Bush will tell the US military to do more with less and then blame it all on the Democrats."

Or am I being too cynical?

[Rasputin]

Originally Posted by The Universal Curmudgeon_guest

Read as "In an effort to buy votes from the unthinking, Mr. Bush will tell the US military to do more with less and then blame it all on the Democrats."

Or am I being too cynical?

I resent that. The only cynics I know live in the White House so please don't try to get credit for being cynical.
The fact that our dear leader continues to stay the course only shows that he cares little about the human and financial loses that his personal war has brought upon us. I would like to quote some excerpts from E.L. Doctorow "Essay on President Bush and Death".

..."But this president does not know what death is. He hasn't the mind for it. You see him joking with the press, peering under the table for the WMD's he can't seem to find, you see him at rallies strutting up to the stage in shirt sleeves to the roar of the carefully screened crowd, smiling and waving, triumphal, a he-man. He does not mourn. He doesn't understand why he should mourn. He is satisfied during the course of a speech written for him, to look solemn for a moment and speak of the brave young americans who made the ultimate sacrifice for their country.
But you study him, you look into his eyes and know he dissembles an emotion which he does not feel in the depths of his being because he has no capacity for it..... To mourn is to express regret and he regrets nothing.....So he never mourns for the dead and crippled youngsters who have fought this war of his choice. He wanted to go to war and he did...He did not understand that you do not go to war when it is one of the options, but when it is the only option; you do not go to war because you want to but because you have to...
He cannot mourn but he is a figure of such moral vacancy as to make us mourn for ourselves"