is leaving 50,000 troops in iraq anticlimactic?

[patrick t. cakes]

watching countdown, it appears U.S. troops will be going out on patrol with Iraqi troops.

whats the difference? we still have a giant army in Iraq. Is there a time table for the 50,000? or are they there indefinitely?

[Greyhound]

1. They're the Palace Guards fro the "Largest Embassy On Earth".

Then of course, there are the thousands of mercenaries being brought in to keep the gravy train rolling...

Didn't we used to declare victory and leave?

[cherokeeprogressive]

2. 50,000 American Servicemen and Women.

Combat Troops or not, they all wear the same color boots, and are all bought and paid for by US Taxpayers.

[Javaman]

3. You know the difference between a combat troop and a non combat troop in Iraq?

One is outside the wall, the other is inside the wall.

[Bandit]

4. I seem to recall Rumsfeld wanted ONLY fifty thousand troops in the first place

He allowed himself to be talked into a hundred thousand but felt it was complete overkill

[pampango]

5. They're all over. 52,000 in Germany, 35,000 in Japan, and 28,000 in South Korea.

As of March 31, 2008, U.S. armed forces were stationed at more than 820 installations in at least 135 countries. Some of the largest contingents are the 50,000 military personnel deployed in Iraq, the 71,000 in Afghanistan, the 52,440 in Germany (see list), the 35,688 in Japan (USFJ), the 28,500 in Republic of Korea (USFK), and the 9,660 in Italy and the 9,015 in the United Kingdom respectively. These numbers change frequently due to the regular recall and deployment of units.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_armed_forces#Overseas

[Statistical]

7. Personally I think we need (we no longer have a choice) for those nations to pay their own way.

Either they can pay us the cost to maintain & operate those bases OR we leave and they can spend 5x that on their own military expenditures.

Even IF it was a good idea we simply can't afford to be the world's policeman any longer.

[lunatica]

6. The US military has 268 bases in Germany

From an article in Foreign Policy in Focus in 2009

http://www.fpif.org/articles/too_many_overseas_bases


Officially the Pentagon counts 865 base sites, but this notoriously unreliable number omits all our bases in Iraq (likely over 100) and Afghanistan (80 and counting), among many other well-known and secretive bases. More than half a century after World War II and the Korean War, we still have 268 bases in Germany, 124 in Japan, and 87 in South Korea. Others are scattered around the globe in places like Aruba and Australia, Bulgaria and Bahrain, Colombia and Greece, Djibouti, Egypt, Kuwait, Qatar, Romania, Singapore, and of course, Guantánamo Bay, Cuba — just to name a few. Among the installations considered critical to our national security are a ski center in the Bavarian Alps, resorts in Seoul and Tokyo, and 234 golf courses the Pentagon runs worldwide.

Unlike domestic bases, which set off local alarms when threatened by closure, our collection of overseas bases is particularly galling because almost all our taxpayer money leaves the United States (much goes to enriching private base contractors like corruption-plagued former Halliburton subsidiary KBR). One part of the massive Ramstein airbase near Landstuhl, Germany, has an estimated value of $3.3 billion. Just think how local communities could use that kind of money to make investments in schools, hospitals, jobs, and infrastructure.

more at the link...

[Gaedel]

8. "Number" of overseas bases is a bad indicator

Overseas, the US does not have massive bases like Fort Hood, TX or Fort Bragg, NC.

Back in 1966, I was the "Stationing Officer" in Seventh Army HQ and visited large numbers of "posts" in Germany as a part of my job. We had large numbers of rather of installations of rather insignificant size. As an example, Hanau had about fifteen "installations" of which some had no troops living there (they just worked there) and some had only 250 or so troops living there. It would be like moving Fort Hood to Austin and having twenty or thirty little "kasernes" for the troops and little battalion-sized training areas in the country-side aropund Austin plus a logisitcs installation (or four or five) down by the rail yards.

Lots of those "installations" are radar sites of small military equipment delivery teams.

[lunatica]

10. I'm sure they'll do the same in Iraq and in Afghanistan

If you're going to have military bases in other countries it stands to reason that you'd have 'outposts' too.

I would argue that there's a difference between National Security and National Interests. If Iraq didn't have oil Saddam would still be the dictator. The only countries that seem to get our wars now are those countries on top of our National Interests.

[mike r]

9. It's like Hotel California

You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave