{news} Dems' proposed Iraq bill wouldn't end the war (AP)

[Clifford Thornton]

Democrats' bill on Iraq wouldn't end war

By ANNE FLAHERTY, Associated Press Writer
November 23, 2007
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071123/ap_on_go_co/democrats_iraq<http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071123/ap_on_go_co/democrats_iraq>
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/11/23/5402/<http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/11/23/5402/>


WASHINGTON - The Democrats' flagship proposal on
Iraq is aimed at bringing most troops home. Yet
if enacted, the law would still allow for tens of
thousands of U.S. troops to stay deployed for
years to come. 

This reality - readily acknowledged by Democrats
who say it's still their best shot at curbing the
nearly five-year war - has drawn the ire of
anti-war groups and bolstered President Bush's
prediction that the United States will most
likely wind up maintaining a hefty long-term
presence in Iraq, much like in South Korea.

For those who want troops out, "you've got more
holes in here than Swiss cheese," said Tom
Andrews, national director of the war protest
group Win Without War and a former congressman
from Maine.

The Democratic proposal would order troops to
begin leaving Iraq within 30 days, a requirement
Bush is already on track to meet as he begins
reversing this year's 30,000 troop buildup. The
proposal also sets a goal of ending combat by
Dec. 15, 2008.

After that, troops remaining in Iraq would be
restricted to three missions: counterterrorism,
training Iraqi security forces and protecting
U.S. assets, including diplomats.

This month, Senate Republicans blocked the
measure, even though it was tied to $50 billion
needed by the military, because they said it
would impose an artificial timetable on a war
that has been showing signs of progress.

Despite the GOP's fierce opposition and a White
House veto threat, military officials and
analysts say the proposal leaves open the door
for a substantial force to remain behind.
Estimates range from as few as a couple thousand
troops to as many as 70,000 or more to accomplish
those three missions.

There are about 164,000 troops in Iraq now.

Maj. Gen. Michael Barbero, deputy chief of staff
for operations in Iraq, declined to estimate how
many troops might be needed under the Democrats'
plan but said it would be hard to accomplish any
of those missions without a significant force.

"It's a combination of all of our resources and
capabilities to be able to execute these missions
the way that we are," Barbero said in a recent
phone interview from Baghdad.

For example, Barbero said that "several thousand"
troops are assigned to specialized anti-terrorism
units focused on capturing high profile terrorist
targets. But they often rely on the logistics,
security and intelligence provided by
conventional troops, he said.

"When a brigade is operating in a village,
meeting with locals, asking questions, collecting
human intelligence on these very same (terrorist)
organizations, that intelligence comes back and
is merged and fed into this counterterrorism
unit," Barbero said. "So are they doing
counterterrorism operations?

"It's all linked and simultaneous," he added.
"You can't separate it cleanly like that."

It's also difficult to precisely say how many
U.S. troops are tasked with training the Iraqi
security forces.

Christine Wormuth, who served as staff director
of Gen. James Jones' commission on training Iraqi
security forces, said she estimates some 8,000 to
10,000 troops are dedicated to training. These
"transition teams" are tasked solely with
training and equipping Iraqi police, army, air
force, maritime and intelligence forces.

But an undetermined number of additional troops
provide "on the job" training for Iraqi security
forces by conducting daily patrols and other
combat missions alongside them, she said.

Last year, the Iraq Study Group, a bipartisan
commission whose findings were the basis for the
Democratic proposal, recommended that 10,000 to
20,000 troops should be embedded with Iraqi
combat units.

Senate Democrats who championed the proposal say
it was written deliberately to give the military
flexibility and not cap force levels. Unlike
their counterparts in the House, many Senate
Democrats have opposed stronger measures that
would set firm deadlines on troop withdrawals or
effectively force an end to the war by cutting
off money for combat. 

"There's no way to say down the line how many
insurgency threats there will be, how many
militia threats there will be, how many al-Qaida
and other terrorist threats there will be," said
Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., chairman of the Armed
Services Committee. 

Still, Levin and other Democrats say the U.S.
could still launch effective anti-terrorism
strikes in Iraq using elite special operations
forces without the massive footprint of
conventional forces. 

"We've been told now that 90 percent of the Iraqi
units are capable of taking the lead, so six or
nine months from now we would expect those units
would not only be taking the lead, they would be
handling those missions," he said. 

Rep. John Murtha, who helped lead the anti-war
effort in the House this year, said the bill
might leave as few as 3,000 or as many as 30,000
troops, but that the broader message would be to
blur the U.S. footprint substantially. 

"I'm willing to negotiate, but I think the most
vulnerable part of this operation is the
logistics tail," which should be taken out of
enemy reach, he said. 

Meanwhile, military analysts caution against
worrying too much about the particulars. The
legislation has yet to pass Congress by a
veto-proof majority. It also isn't binding; under
the bill, Bush can ignore the 2008 deadline to
end combat. 

Indeed, the legislation is more of a signal to
the White House that Congress' patience with the
war is gone, than any mandate on how to run
operations. That could explain why entities like
the Government Accountability Office have not
examined the ramifications of the bill. 

Or as Anthony Cordesman, a national security
analyst at the Center for Strategic and
International Studies in Washington, put it: "As
long as you're discussing a bill that is designed
for political purposes, you don't have to get
down to the issue of whether it would work or
not."


Efficacy
PO Box 1234
860 657 8438
Hartford, CT 06143
efficacy at msn.com<mailto:efficacy at msn.com>
www.Efficacy-online.org<http://www.efficacy-online.org/>
 
"THE DRUG WAR IS MEANT TO BE WAGED NOT WON"

Working to end race and class drug war injustice, Efficacy is a non profit
501 (c) 3 organization founded in 1997. Your gifts and donations are tax
deductible




-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://pairlist10.pair.net/mailman/private/ctgp-news/attachments/20071124/1a8a0153/attachment.html>