>>As the retired Gen. BARRY MCCAFFREY reported to the Senate, the National Guard is "in the stage of meltdown and in 24 months we'll be coming apart." >>
"It's a race against time because by the end of this coming summer we can no longer sustain the presence we have now." This is a statement from retired General Barry R. McCaffrey, who visited Iraq in June and briefed Cheney, Rice and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. "This thing, the wheels are coming off it." This is a statement made by the Army's top personnel officer who announced that the US Army won't meet its recruiting goals for 2005. So far this year, the active duty army has enlisted 47,121 recruits. The goal was 80,000. Officials have conceded that there is little chance to make up the gap. Logistically, this shows the volunteer US army is incapable of going the distance in sustained operations in its occupation of Iraq. Militarily, it is a wasting asset.
Don't doubt for a moment that this is known in Tehran in Iran, in downtown Baghdad, and in London, Moscow and Beijing. I've reached the conclusion that the US army "turns the corner" sometime between September/October this year. That is the time when large segments of the US National Guard and the reserves have to return back to the US.
The only real replacements that the US armed forces have in hand are the 148,000 US troops which are now serving in garrisons in Germany, South Korea, Japan, Italy and the UK at an annual cost to the American taxpayers of $US 178 Billion. I've noticed that they are being drawn upon. |
