Bush Leaves Troops above Pre-Surge Levels

President Bush yesterday announced that 8,000 US combat and support troops will be leaving Iraq-Nam by February 2009. With 146,000 American uniformed personnel currently in country, that means the number of troops there will still exceed the 130,000 pre-surge level.

Speaking yesterday at the National Defense University in Washington, the president said, “Here is the bottom line: While the enemy in Iraq is still dangerous, we have seized the offensive, and Iraqi forces are becomingly increasingly capable of leading and winning the fight.” He added, “if the progress in Iraq continues to hold, General Petraeus and our military leaders believe additional reductions will be possible in the first half of 2009.”

MSNBC reports the break down of units to be “One Marine battalion, numbering about 1,000 troops, will go home on schedule in November and not be replaced. An Army brigade of between 3,500 and 4,000 troops will leave in February. Accompanying that combat drawdown will be the withdrawal of about 3,400 support forces over next several months.”

At the same time, Mr. Bush announced more US troops will be heading to Afghanistan. “So today, I am announcing additional American troop deployments to Afghanistan. In November, a Marine battalion that was scheduled to deploy to Iraq will instead deploy to Afghanistan. It will be followed in January by an Army combat brigade.”

Three points stand out in this story. First, at the very beginning of the war, there was a plan, a timetable, that said US forces would be long gone by now. In future conflicts, presuming a rapid end and a quick withdrawal should be acknowledged for what they are, disastrously wishful thinking. Second, implicit in this decision is the fragility of whatever success the White House is claiming. If the situation were better, more troops could come home sooner. Third, the gradual withdrawal of troops from Iraq-Nam and the reinforcement of US military assets in Afghanistan has been the stated policy of Senator Obama for some months.

© Copyright 2008 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

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