Aww,hell. You're a Flyers fan!
Too bad my Pens kicked your butts 5 times this year!
Posted on 12/17/2006 10:41:36 AM PST by Extremely Extreme Extremist
Exclusive: Former Secretary Of State Says More Troops Isn't The Answer
(CBS News) WASHINGTON -- The United States is losing the war in Iraq but sending more troops to Baghdad is not the best way to change course, former Secretary of State Colin Powell said on Face The Nation.
Powell said he agreed with the assessment of the Iraq Study Group co-chairmen, Lee Hamilton and James Baker, that the situation in Iraq is "grave and deteriorating," and he also agreed with recently-confirmed Secretary of Defense Robert Gates that the U.S. is not winning the war.
"So if it's grave and deteriorating and we're not winning, we are losing," Powell told Bob Schieffer in an exclusive interview. "We haven't lost. And this is the time, now, to start to put in place the kinds of strategies that will turn this situation around."
President George W. Bush is considering several options for a new strategy in Iraq. The most likely choice would be to send tens of thousands of additional troops for an indefinite period to quickly secure Baghdad.
A 3,500-man brigade from the 82nd Airborne Division will be sent to Kuwait soon after the holidays, CBS News correspondent David Martin reported on Friday. The troops would be available immediately should the president order a surge into Iraq.
There are about 134,000 U.S. troops in Iraq now.
Powell, also a former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said he did not see the military benefit of flooding Baghdad with American troops.
"I am not persuaded that another surge of troops into Baghdad for the purposes of suppressing this communitarian violence, this civil war, will work," he said, adding that the Iraqi government and security forces must take over.
"It is the D.C. police force that guards Washington, D.C., not the troops that are stationed at Fort Myer," Powell said. "And in Baghdad, you need a police force to do that, and in the other cities, you need a police force to do that, and not the American troops."
Powell also doubted that the U.S. Army and Marine Corps are large enough to support such an operation.
"The current active Army is not large enough and the Marine Corps is not large enough for the kinds of missions they're being asked to perform," Powell said. "We need to let both the Army and the Marine Corps grow in size, in my military judgment."
Asked directly what the U.S. should do in Iraq, Powell said:
"I think that what we should do is to work with the Iraqi government, press them on the political peace, do everything we can to provide equipment, advisers, and whatever the Iraqi armed forces need to become more competent, and to train their leaders so that those leaders realize their responsibility to the government."
Powell, who as a member of the Bush Administration pushed the international community to sanction the invasion of Iraq, said that we are not safer now after nearly four years of fighting.
"I think we are a little less safe, in the sense that we don't have the same force structure available for other problems," Powell said. "I think we have been somewhat constrained in our ability to influence events elsewhere."
Look, seeing this is as frustrating to me. I have NO clue what ultimately is going to work. I just think letting the carnage escalate between Sunnis and Shia would only make the goals of the mission more elusive. "To get it over with" will likely not come soon enough. Chaos in Iraq will be perfect ground for alQaeda to flourish.Getting rid of AlQaeda in Iraq, again, is just part of the mission of leaving behind a stable Iraq able to"govern itself, defend itself and being an ally" as Bush and others have stated over and over again.
Unfortunately, there are hundreds like him.
Come on get over my unAmerican comment. I take it back and apologize, OK. I just thought what you were advocating was not consistent with a long tradition of noble American foreign policy behavior. Thats all. I never meand to doubt your identity or patriotism
"A lot of name calling here."
That is what constitutes "disussion" on FR these days. For certain individuals (McCain, Powell, all democrats, most Republicans) you must repeat the mantra.
Step out of line, and you too can join the list.
I never called you un American,or anything else.
I simply pointed out the falsehood in your post.
Direct your indignation elsewhere.
Yeah, it is a real mess over there. I don't know what's going to work. I've heard this idea that withdrawal to bases or the threat of total withdrawal might knock some sense into them, but I seriously doubt that will work. The danger is that the violence will just spiral out of control until it becomes a full-fledged civil war and then a regional war as neighbouring powers get involved (like Saudi said they would the other day). That would be seriously bad for everyone.
I can't honestly say that I think the outlook is good for democracy or even stability in Iraq. I accept that a lot of unexpected problems occurred but I also think the Bush team made a lot of errors and didn't prepare realistically for negative post-invasion scenarios. We should have had more troops initially and we shouldn't have disbanded the Iraqi army or thrown out every mid-level bureaucrat just because they had a Ba'ath party card. But right now, the alternative to victory as the President has defined it is damn scary.
You are right on with what you say. I think in the end we will side with the Saudi backed Sunni because we have many more diplomatic channels to go to on that side and the big picture has now become Iran. It will probably come down to the Shia in Iraq having to decide if they want to be Arab or second class citizens on the side of the non-Arab Iranians.
We don't need more fighting soldiers. We need more army engineers.
We need to make the streets wide, relocate the Shia to the south, the Sunnis to Sunni areas and execute any who carry arms or munitions.
IOW, we need to change the Rules of Engagement. If we don't do that, we will not succeed!
Aww,hell. You're a Flyers fan!
Too bad my Pens kicked your butts 5 times this year!
Powell is just a liberal bozo,an expert on affirmative action.
I'm not being indignant towards you. I just have already said earlier I made a mistake. Sorry if you took it that way. But I was not trying to be false in my post. It does seem like I've been posting here along time.
Oh man, how about that Crosby kid. What a sweet player he is!!
Remember When "He" was our next president?
OBAMA-YO-MAMA Wlll be a has been too in 1 year.
The war is over in Irag we won ,now were just trying to keep these nutso,s from killing each other.
Powell is the looser, not America.
Powell has proven to be adversary to President Bush and the Republican Party.
Looks as though he is starting to use Jessy Jackson's hand book on political sabotage.
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