Word: drawdown
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...Already, the drawdown of troops is accelerating. The Pentagon announced Wednesday that a brigade of the 101st Airborne division will rotate out of Iraq before Christmas, as much as two months ahead of schedule, bringing the total number of combat brigades in Iraq down to 14 from its late 2007 peak of 20. But there is a limit to how quickly U.S. soldiers can depart the country while maintaining the current level of security. Although security has improved dramatically in many neighborhoods in Baghdad over the past year, the ability of the Iraqi security forces to act independently and effectively...
...TIME, Commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, General Raymond Odierno said the numbers of U.S. troops can and will go down. "We don't have to do it with 150,000; we can do it with less," Odierno told TIME, without specifically addressing Obama's campaign pledge. But the drawdown will have to be done "slowly, in a deliberate way, so we don't give back the gains...
...will fall to Odierno to oversee the implementation of the new agreement and the gradual drawdown of U.S. troops from Iraq as they hand over control to Iraqi security forces. "This struggle is theirs to win," Odierno said. But doubts remain as to whether they can. Odierno's No. 2, Lieut. General Lloyd Austin, said on Monday that he wasn't "sure that pushing [Iraqi security forces] forward is the right thing that we want...
...redeployment is decidedly modest, scaled way back from the drawdown hoped for by some military officials (over the past year, they have suggested that one-third of the current U.S. force could be withdrawn by 2009). Bush plans to withdraw 8,000 troops around the time he leaves office on Jan. 20, leaving about 137,000 in Iraq for the next President to deal with. Barack Obama, the Democratic nominee, has declared that he would withdraw all U.S. combat forces within 16 months of taking office; GOP nominee John McCain has said only that his withdrawal plans would be guided...
...officials say the go-slow drawdown is driven by the fragility of the security gains in Iraq, where attacks by insurgents have fallen 80% since last year. But a lack of political progress in the country could trigger more violence, especially if large U.S. units pull out, Pentagon officials say. When the British pulled out of the southern city of Basra in 2007, the resulting vacuum was filled by Shi'ite militia units until the Iraqi government sent in its improving army in March and brought it under Baghdad's control. Petraeus also doesn't want to risk a security...