Word: sofas
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...thing now is to figure out what the world's collection of rich democracies can do with their substantial power. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told the New York Times recently that she once said to European leaders, "Can we take the trans-Atlantic relationship off the sofa? And stop analyzing it and analyzing whether it's healthy, and actually put it to work in common causes?" She has a point...
...Under the status of forces agreement (SOFA) approved by Washington and the Iraqi cabinet, U.S. troop withdrawals will accelerate in the months ahead until all of the 150,000 U.S. troops now in Iraq will will be gone by New Year's Day 2012, leaving behind only a Marine guard unit of the type that protects U.S. embassies all over the world. Like kids getting set to take a roller coaster ride, the U.S. military is about to forfeit a lot of control over their fate in Iraq in the next three years. (See pictures of five years...
...Speaking from Baghdad on Monday, Army Colonel John Hort of the 4th Infantry Division's 3rd Brigade Combat Team, said that the SOFA simply recognizes what is already happening inside Iraq. "We're kind of already moving in that direction - even prior to the SOFA - with the Iraqi army taking more and more responsibility, more and more of the lead, particularly the targeting of the bad people," Hort told Pentagon reporters in a video press conference. "So I don't see a significant change...
...SOFA deal, which creates a legal basis for foreign forces to remain in Iraq beyond the December 31 deadline when the current U.N. mandate expires, not only sets a three-year deadline for U.S. troops to leave Iraq; it also requires that they leave Iraq's cities by June 30 of next year. The troops would redeploy to bases in the countryside, from which they could be called into action to support Iraqi security forces, as they currently do across much of Iraq. The SOFA also gives Iraq expanded legal jurisdiction when serious crimes are committed by U.S. troops...
...election of Barack Obama was one of the factors that pushed the SOFA process along, Pentagon officials say. The President-elect had proposed on the campaign trail to withdraw U.S. combat forces from Iraq within 16 months of taking office, a position closer to the Iraqi government's than to that taken by the Bush Administration. The intra-Iraqi squabbling over the pact, partly fueled by Iran's concerns, evaporated following Obama's election two weeks ago. "I am hopeful that conditions will continue to improve, so we can continue" to withdraw U.S. troops, Mullen said. But if ordered...