Maybe the Iraqi government would understand the need and agree to joint military bases in their country?
"Maybe the Iraqi government would understand the need and agree to joint military bases in their country?"
Surely the plan is to maintain a small footprint in Iraq once the country stabilizes. With the permission of the Iraqi government we would keep training their forces in weapon systems we will provide them, train them in all the logistics required to maintain and aid their ground forces by air, e.g. their fledging air force, etc.. In short perform the same things the Russians and French did for a long time. Surely with their government's approval we would maintian military Intel units (airforce,army,Marines,navy), and most probably have a CIA presence. One thing that probably is certain. Perhaps it will boil down to making aggreements with them such as we have in Europe and S. Korea to maintian a presence based on mutual needs. As in Bahrain, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, for instance we maintian a presence. Yes I understand that most of our stuff left SA. But the point is some of the ME countries have allowed us to maintain a presence and in the case of Bahrain and Qatar allow us to have a permenant regional HQ (CENTCOM) facility, and obviously in Kuwait, we are allowed to maintain and use a number of camps to rotate our troops in and out of Iraq, as well as use their Ali Salami AFB etc..
Dispite the often voiced connections between say Iran and certain segments of the Shi'ite religious groups and some Iranian insurgent activities, the new Iraq wants nothing to do with the Persians other then trade with them. They don't want Persian influence in Iraq. They look at Iran as a de-stablizing factor. Similiarly with Syria, they can't be trusted. So it would appear natural that we shall be invited to stay in Iraq for a long time. If they want our continued support in the future, they must accomodate their helpers.
And due to the whole situation, we are on the ground in Iraq etc., it is hard to see how they would just want us to leave, and invite the French or Russians back in. After all the Russians failed them, we did not. We freed them from tyrany once and for all.