Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: PROLIFE who wrote (564155)	4/14/2004 12:49:49 AM
From: tejek	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769667

Oh oh......just as Mr. Bush gets around to authorizing more troops in Iraq, it may prove to be too late! ************************************************** Posted 4/13/2004 11:08 PM Bush open to more troops, but critics say it may not help By Dave Moniz and Tom Squitieri, USA TODAY WASHINGTON — President Bush's promise to send more troops to Iraq if U.S. commanders request them still may not stabilize the country, many military analysts say.** During his news conference Tuesday, Bush said if Gen. John Abizaid, commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East, asks for two additional brigades of combat troops, as expected, he would grant the request. "If that's what he wants, that's what he gets," Bush said. But those additional troops — between 5,000 and 10,000 soldiers — still might not be adequate to stem an increasingly bold insurgency, the analysts say. Charles Pena, director of defense studies at the Cato Institute says that adding U.S. troops will only "make the problem worse" and increase Iraqi resentment. The decision by Bush to abandon a plan that would have reduced U.S. troop levels from 135,000 to 105,000 undercuts earlier U.S. predictions about the force size needed for Iraq and was prompted by disturbing developments: • The Iraqi insurgency has moved into a more deadly phase in which massed attacks on U.S. troops have replaced isolated ambushes with homemade bombs. • U.S. troops, working with Iraqi forces, have been unable to seal off Iraq's borders and prevent foreign fighters from entering. Bush said he was "disappointed" in the performance of some Iraqi troops. • New guerrilla tactics, including the taking of dozens of hostages has threatened everything from foreign investment to the U.S. military's ability to supply troops. • U.S. forces have been forced to engage in deadly "urban warfare" in Iraqi cities. • Help from other nations, which now contribute 24,000 troops, is set to wane this summer. Those factors have compounded what critics see as flawed planning assumptions by the Pentagon, whose leaders a year ago said most Iraqis would embrace the occupation and that U.S. troop levels would be reduced by this summer. Before the war, Gen. Eric Shinseki, then the Army's chief of staff, warned Congress that 225,000 U.S. troops would be needed in Iraq for years; Pentagon officials attacked his estimate as wildly inaccurate. U.S. officials say new troops could be hard to find. Options include sending the Army's 3rd Infantry, 3rd Brigade, which was one of the first into Baghdad last year; one rapid-deployment brigade of the 82nd Airborne Division or Marines from the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force. Or, the Pentagon could freeze planned redeployments of troops now in Iraq or accelerate the deployment of units notified on March 1 that they face Iraq duty. The larger issue, particularly for the Army, is whether lengthy duty in Iraq sparks an exodus of soldiers. Bush said U.S. troops will stay in Iraq "as long as necessary." "We are in a race against time to develop indigenous Iraqi forces before American forces vote with their feet and leave the military," says Andrew Krepinevich, director of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. usatoday.com