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Politics : The Obama - Clinton Disaster -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bill who wrote (20028)	9/30/2009 10:59:52 AM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 103300

U.S. General Says Iraq Exit Is on Track * SEPTEMBER 30, 2009, 5:25 A.M. ET online.wsj.com By YOCHI J. DREAZEN WASHINGTON -- The top U.S. commander in Iraq said the U.S. is on pace to withdraw tens of thousands of troops from Iraq in coming months despite a spate of recent attacks there. In an interview, Gen. Raymond Odierno, who is due to testify on Capitol Hill about the war Wednesday, said American troop levels in Iraq will fall to 115,000 by year-end and then to roughly 50,000 by mid-2010. A bilateral security accord between Washington and Baghdad calls for the remaining troops to leave Iraq by the end of 2011. The comments from Gen. Odierno offer the clearest indication to date of how senior commanders in Baghdad envision winding down the U.S.-led war in Iraq, which the Obama administration sees as a lower national-security priority than the war in Afghanistan. They come as the Pentagon holds on to a request from the top American commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, for up to 40,000 reinforcements. The Obama administration is re-evaluating its entire Afghan strategy in the wake of flawed presidential elections there and a wave of Taliban violence. Gen. Odierno warned that the war in Iraq is far from over, with political challenges -- such as unresolved Kurdish-Arab tensions over oil and control of northern Iraq -- posing serious challenges to the country's future stability. "It's not so much about an insurgency anymore," he said in the interview at the Pentagon. "The disputes are about the very nature of the Iraqi state." Gen. Odierno arrived in Iraq in April 2003 with the Fourth Infantry Division, and has spent a total of nearly four years in the country. He said he is increasingly confident Iraq's recent security gains are irreversible despite high-profile attacks like the string of bombings in Baghdad last month that killed roughly 100 people. "We'll have bad days in Iraq," he said. "But the bad days are becoming fewer. The numbers of deaths are becoming fewer. We're making slow, deliberate progress." Gen. Odierno said remnants of al Qaeda in Iraq and other militant groups were carrying out some operations in Baghdad, but had been unable to re-create the sophisticated bomb-making networks they used to destabilize the Iraqi capital during the bloodiest days of Iraq's civil war. The militants are instead working to expand their foothold in the volatile city of Mosul and to carry out new bombings in northern Iraq designed to exacerbate Kurdish-Arab tensions there, the commander said. "That's the No. 1 potential driver of instability," he said. "I worry that the political rhetoric can lead to violence and real problems up in northern Iraq." Gen. Odierno said the country was facing political uncertainty in advance of the parliamentary elections scheduled for January. The most intensive jockeying is taking place within the country's Shiite Arab majority, whose two largest parties are likely to abandon a longstanding alliance to run against each other. At the American high command in Baghdad, senior officials are continuing to hone their withdrawal plans. The U.S. has closed or relinquished more than 100 small bases, and plans to leave dozens of other small outposts in coming months. Write to Yochi J. Dreazen at yochi.dreazen@wsj.com Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page A9 Copyright 2009 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved

To: Bill who wrote (20028)	9/30/2009 2:53:45 PM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 103300

US speeding up military withdrawal from Iraq September 30, 2009 Lara Jakes realclearpolitics.com The United States is speeding up its military withdrawal from Iraq, sending 4,000 more troops home next month, the top American commander there says. The reduced number of troops in Iraq — from 124,000 to 120,000 by the end of October — marks the latest U.S. step in winding down the six-year war. The reduction was to be announced Wednesday by Army Gen. Ray Odierno. "We have already begun deliberately drawing down our forces — without sacrificing security," Odierno said in a statement he was to deliver to the House Armed Services Committee. "As we go forward, we will thin our lines across Iraq in order to reduce the risk and sustain stability through a deliberate transition of responsibilities to the Iraqi security forces," Odierno said. A copy of the testimony was obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press. A Defense Department official confirmed Odierno planned to announce he is reducing the number of brigades in Iraq, as has been widely expected. In his eight-page statement, Odierno voiced cautious optimism about Iraq's future. But his outlook for the nation he called an enduring U.S. interest was far from rosy. He predicted several looming problems as U.S. troops prepare to end combat missions by September 2010 and leave Iraq at the end of 2011. Those problems include: _"A clear security lapse," Odierno said, was evidenced by a pair of truck bombings Aug. 19 at Iraq's finance and foreign ministries, which killed about 100 people in Baghdad. _A system of government that is accepted across what Odierno described as ethnic, sectarian and regional lines has yet to be agreed on. He described a power struggle between provincial officials and Baghdad and said long-standing tensions continue to stall progress between Arabs and Kurds. As the January elections approach, military officials have identified Arab-Kurd tensions as one of the top concerns for potential violence, especially in contested territories in the oil-rich north that each side claims as its own. Still, Odierno said the darkest days of the Iraq war seem to be long gone, citing failed efforts by extremists still seeking to destabilize the nation. "The overwhelming majority of the Iraqi people have rejected extremism," Odierno said. "We see no indications of a return to the sectarian violence that plagued Iraq in 2006-2007." _Although Iraqi leaders had planned to find government jobs for all members of a group known as Sons of Iraq, who helped curb the insurgency, "we do not believe they will meet this timeline," Odierno said. "We continue to monitor the progress of this program very closely." Iraq's government promised to open thousands of police and military jobs, dominated by Shiites, to the Sons of Iraq, who are mostly Sunni. But the government has been accused by Sunnis of dragging its feet on integrating the jobs. Odierno, however, said 23,000 former Sons of Iraq have begun working in government jobs since 2008, and 5,000 more will start next month. On the bright side, Odierno cited data showing that the monthly number of attacks in Iraq has dramatically dropped over the last two years — from more than 4,000 in August 2007 to about 600 last month. He also said that far fewer al-Qaida and foreign fighters remain in Iraq, and most of those who are left are criminals and disenfranchised Iraqis who have been recruited by what Odierno described as a "small ideological core" of insurgents. The Associated Press