Thomas Ricks reports on the formulation of a decision to keep US military in Iraq after a "drawdown."
One of the guiding principles, according to two officials here, is that the United States should leave Iraq more intelligently than it entered. ...A reduction of troops, some officials argue, would demonstrate to anti-American factions that the occupation will not last forever while reassuring Iraqi allies that the United States does not intend to abandon the country.
So what would this mean?
Such a long-term presence would have four major components. The centerpiece would be a reinforced mechanized infantry division of around 20,000 soldiers assigned to guarantee the security of the Iraqi government and to assist Iraqi forces or their U.S. advisers if they get into fights they can't handle.
Second, a training and advisory force of close to 10,000 troops would work with Iraqi military and police units. "I think it would be very helpful to have a force here for a period of time to continue to help the Iraqis train and continue to build their capabilities," Odierno said.
In addition, officials envision a small but significant Special Operations unit focused on fighting the Sunni insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq. "I think you'll retain a very robust counterterror capability in this country for a long, long time," a Pentagon official in Iraq said.
Finally, the headquarters and logistical elements to command and supply such a force would total more than 10,000 troops, plus some civilian contractors.
"Plus some civilian contractors." Just because it's tucked in at the end of a sensible sounding plan doesn't reduce its import. While the overall plan makes some sense, as long as we take seriously the intention that "the occupation will not last forever," we need to make sure that "plus some civilian contractors" isn't the biggest engine driving this "intelligent guiding principle."
There are more good reasons to doubt "intelligent guiding principles" from this administration than to accept them. Michael Stickings goes after one sacred cow -- David Petraeus -- like a banderillero.
He may indeed by quite competent. But, more and more, he's looking like yet another Bushie. Not a Bushie like Harriett Miers or Andy Card or Alberto Gonzales -- no, not a slavish sycophant, not a corrupt crony -- but a Bushie with respect to his deception in support of Bush's war, his doing of Bush's bidding. Like so many of the others at the center of this war, from the warmongers in Washington to many of those actually waging the war, Petraeus has shifted his views -- i.e., uttered lies, saying one thing and then the complete opposite, without any nuance at all -- in order to defend the indefensible, which is what this war has become...
...Now what we have is the top U.S. military official in Iraq claiming that the surge hasn't even started just two months after he declared it was already two months old. Oh, he caught himself: the full surge hasn't started yet. But since when were there two surges, the not-full and the full? Well, since it became clear -- and it has, more and more -- that the surge, the one surge that was intended, has been a miserable failure.
But there can be no admission of failure, hence the Bushiness of Petraeus's self-contradictory remark. Instead of admitting to failure, Petraeus has simply changed the rules of the game...
If we accept a long-term stay in Iraq, formulated by members of this particular administration, are we getting another bait-and-switch? a larger playground for Blackwater? a "miserable failure"? Or is this a perfectly sensible solution?
