Posted on 01/24/2005 9:07:31 PM PST by Former Military Chick
The U.S. Army expects to keep its troop strength in Iraq at the current level of about 120,000 for at least two more years, according to the Army's top operations officer.
While allowing for the possibility that the levels could decrease or increase depending on security conditions and other factors, Lt. Gen. James J. Lovelace Jr. told reporters yesterday that the assumption of little change through 2006 represents "the most probable case."
Recent disclosures that the Pentagon plans to beef up training of Iraqi security forces and press them into action more quickly has fueled speculation that the Bush administration could be preparing to reduce the number of U.S. troops significantly this year. As more Iraqi troops join the fight, the thinking goes, U.S. troops could begin to withdraw.
But Lovelace's remarks indicated that the Army is not yet counting on any such reduction. Indeed, the general said, the Army expects to continue rotating active-duty units in and out of Iraq in year-long deployments and is looking for ways to dip even deeper into reserve forces -- even as leaders of the reserves have warned that the Pentagon could be running out of such units.
"We're making the assumption that the level of effort is going to continue," Lovelace said.
In a related development, Senate and House aides said yesterday that the White House will announce today plans to request an additional $80 billion to finance the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. That would come on top of $25 billion already appropriated for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1. White House budget spokesman Chad Kolton declined to comment.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Here should be our exit strategery.
For every 10000 iraqis we trained, we take 5000 of our men out. We try to get the NATO countries to help with the training.
This doesn't make sense - if we already have trained over 100,000 Iraqi forces then why can't we begin to withdraw after the election? Shouldn't Iraqi forces be replacing U.S. forces rather quickly now?
It seems to me that this is a hit piece from the Washington Post.
Our military will be in Iraq or someplace else in ME for years to come.
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