Word: pentagons
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...same time, however, the Pentagon is in no rush to hand over responsibility for defending the country to Iraqis. Many on Capitol Hill and in the Pentagon had expected sharp cuts in U.S. troop levels there to begin this fall, but instead, the Pentagon is urging a more gentle paring of its 146,000 troop complement in Iraq. Following the Defense Department's recommendation, President Bush is expected on Tuesday to announce an 8,000-troop cut due to occur by the time his successor is inaugurated on January...
...Still, U.S. officials inside and out of the Pentagon were quick to say Iraq needs such high-powered weapons, and that the U.S. defense industry would be more than glad to supply them. "We sometimes roll our eyes when foreign defense ministers come here and want to buy fighters and things like that," a senior Pentagon official said, speaking privately. "But we don't feel that way about Iraq - given their history and neighborhood, they need to have a capable air force." Iraq has not committed to buying the warplanes and, if it does, it will be several years before...
...been able to procure arms since it invaded Kuwait in 1990, and the U.S. invasion in 2003 pretty much crushed whatever military hardware Saddam Hussein had left. So Iraq is starting from scratch in rebuilding its military. "The Iraqi military is growing in strength and capability very rapidly now," Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell says. "They are turning into a very formidable force that not only will be able to deal with internal threats, but also handle external threats in a very dangerous part of the world." While the deal would require reviews from the Pentagon, State Department and Congress...
...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...
...Pentagon recognizes that the mounting toll is making a hard job in Afghanistan even harder. In August, the Air Force stopped issuing the daily airpower summaries boasting only of U.S. successes. When asked why, the Air Force said in an official statement that there is a "need to review the way information is collected." But the sad reality is that so long as the war persists, Afghan civilians will be the ones paying the heaviest price...