Analysis: Surge or Long-Term Increase?

[babylonsister]

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8OL3U800&show_article=1&catnum=0


Analysis: Surge or Long-Term Increase?
Apr 21 12:42 PM US/Eastern
By ROBERT BURNS
AP Military Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Pentagon is laying the groundwork to extend the U.S. troop buildup in Iraq. At the same time, the administration is warning Iraqi leaders that the boost in forces could be reversed if political reconciliation is not evident by summer.

This approach underscores the central difficulty facing President Bush. If political progress is not possible in the relatively short term, then the justification for sending thousands more U.S. troops to Baghdad—and accepting the rising U.S. combat death toll that has resulted—will disappear. That in turn would put even more pressure on Bush to yield to the Democratic-led push to wind down the war in coming months.

If the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki does manage to achieve the political milestones demanded by Washington, then the U.S. military probably will be told to sustain the troop buildup much longer than originally foreseen—possibly well into 2008. Thus the early planning for keeping it up beyond late summer.

More than half of the extra 21,500 combat troops designated for Baghdad duty have arrived; the rest are due by June. Already it is evident that putting them in the most hotly contested parts of the capital is taking a toll. An average of 22 U.S. troops have died per week in April, the highest rate so far this year.

"This is certainly a price that we're paying for this increased security," Adm. William Fallon, the senior U.S. commander in the Middle East, told a House committee Wednesday. He also said the United States does not have "a ghost of a chance" of success in Iraq unless it can create "stability and security."

The idea of the troop increase, originally billed by the administration as a temporary "surge," is not to defeat the insurgency. That is not thought possible in the near term. The purpose is to contain the violence—in particular, the sect-on-sect killings in Baghdad—long enough to create an environment in which Iraqi political leaders can move toward conciliation and ordinary Iraqis are persuaded of a viable future.

So far the results are mixed, and Defense Secretary Robert Gates said this week during a visit to Iraq that he wants to see faster political progress by the Iraqis. "The clock is ticking," he said, referring to the limited time the administration can pursue its strategy before the American public demands an end to the war.

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[aint_no_life_nowhere]

1. Have the 11 permanent U.S. military bases been put on hold?

Are they still building the world's largest U.S. Embassy in Baghdad? Is the U.S. continuing to expand the number of mercentary contracts and increase the size of the private mercentary force? Is Bush still saying that if we leave Iraq, leave at all, a giant bloodbath will ensue and we therefore can't leave, surge or no surge? I have a feeling that this surge business is like the work of a good stage magician, getting the audience to watch one hand, while the other hand is setting up the trick.

[tularetom]

2. They're stalling for time

If they can run out the clock until January 2009, they can dump the whole problem in the lap of the next (probably Democratic) administration. The press will then jump right in the middle of the new president's shit and demand that he or she end this terrible war and point out that this once again proves that Democrats cannot be trusted.