Posted on 03/06/2006 7:01:30 PM PST by Aussie Dasher
BRITAIN planned to pull out nearly all its soldiers from Iraq by the middle of 2008, with the first withdrawals within weeks, a top military commander said in an interview published today.
Lieutenant General Nick Houghton, Britain's most senior officer in Iraq, outlined a phased two-year withdrawal plan in an interview with The Daily Telegraph newspaper.
"There is a fine line between staying too long and leaving too soon," he was quoted as saying.
"A military transition over two years has a reasonable chance of avoiding the pitfalls of overstaying our welcome but gives us the best opportunity of consolidating the Iraqi security forces."
Britain has given no firm timetable for the withdrawal of its 8000 troops in Iraq, based in and around the southern port of Basra.
General Houghton said the timeline would work only if Iraqi politicians elected in the December general election formed a national unity government and sectarian tensions did not worsen.
"It is reversible to an extent as there will be residual coalition forces present who can maintain a very low profile," he said. "There may be a need to go back in somewhere."
He said the proposals had been agreed with US military chiefs, but were not set in stone.
General Houghton repeated the long-held position in Washington and London that his forces would only leave once security could be handed over to Iraqi forces.
Last Sunday, the US military in Iraq said media reports that the US and Britain planned to pull out all their troops by the northern spring of 2007 were "completely false" and reiterated there was no timetable for withdrawal.
Two British newspapers reported in their Sunday editions that the pullout plan followed an acceptance by the two governments that the presence of foreign troops in Iraq was now a large obstacle to securing peace.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair has been under pressure to give more details of a pullout. Many Britons opposed the deployment of troops to join the US-led invasion to topple Saddam Hussein in 2003.
I put 95% of the Iraq campaign on the CIA and our good ol intelligence community. Fools.
I thought Prince Harry was on his way over to Iraq sometime soon.
ha yeah right...maybe he will sit in qatar and have a squad + size of security.... and draw combat pay at the same time.
Yep. Add to that the two other biggest mistakes we made:
Going in with too few troops to control the populace after Saddam fell.
And, disbanding the entire rank and file of the Iraqi army, we held no allegiance to Saddam, instead of just getting rid of their Ba'athist leadership.
we held no allegiance to Saddam
WHO held no allegiance to Saddam
Unfortunately, the one guy who could do the job is on trial right now.
Ah, irony.
I largely agree with your sentiment, and in the privacy of my own home even give vent to it in similar tones, but I'd appreciate it if you toned down the language a bit in a public forum (and no, I'm not one to hit the abuse button, but I do know there are younger readers here, including my own eldest daughter)
Please watch the language.
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