Levin has 'no confidence' in Iraq government's promises

[maddezmom]

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Carl Levin said Sunday he has no confidence that Iraq's government will keep its commitment to rein in Shiite militias and address their nation's sectarian political divide -- a commitment the Bush administration has said is crucial to success of the president's new plan for the war.

"Promise after promise has been made and not kept, so I have no confidence in them given their track record," Levin, D-Detroit, said during an appearance on CNN's "Late Edition."

Levin, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, followed Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari on the program. Zebari said U.S. and Iraqi forces would have the ability to go after all the militias responsible for sectarian violence in Baghdad, but was less definitive on the question of whether that included Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr's Madhi Army, which the U.S. military blames for death-squad killings and attacks on American troops.

He did not give a clear answer on that question," Levin said. That failure, added to a long list of cases in the past in which Iraqi officials failed to deliver on military and political promises, means the Bush plan to introduce up to 21,500 more troops to Iraqi is unlikely to succeed, Levin said.

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