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Withdrawing From Iraq
WITHDRAWING FROM IRAQ....General Ray Odierno, the top field commander in Iraq, thinks we can reduce forces there by no more than two brigades over the next six months. 
Then we need to wait until 2010 before making any further decisions: "I believe that if we can get through the next year peacefully, with incidents about what they are today or better, I think we're getting close to enduring stability, which enables us to really reduce," he said. Marc Lynch isn't impressed:
The politics of this aside, I think that Odierno's intention of keeping troops in Iraq through the national elections is dangerously wrong. The CFR/Brookings/Odierno "go slow" approach ignores the reality of the new Status of Forces Agreement and the impending referendum this summer — which may well fail if there is no sign of departing American troops.
....This strategy is also a recipe for endless delay....Senior Iraqi officials have suggested that the national elections, which Odierno suggests as the point when drawdowns might begin, may well not be held until March 2010. I don't think that 16 months is a sacred number. But what Odierno is proposing is no significant drawdowns for 14 months, followed by another period of wrangling. This could ironically make the "rush for the exits" that everyone wants to avoid more rather than less likely — whether or not it leads to the failure of the SOFA referendum.
There's always something a year down the road that we should wait for before pulling troops out. Provincial elections. Stability. SOFA. National elections. You name it. But at some point we need to demonstrate to the Iraqis that we're really pulling out and they need to take the transition seriously. It's well past time for that.
Obama also has a lot of credibility at stake over this. He said during the campaign that he wanted to withdraw within 16 months, and while there's a lot of room to fudge there, he still needs to show that he's serious about that. It may end up being 24 months instead of 16, and the residual force he leaves behind may end up comprising tens of thousands of troops, but he still needs to start. He needs to show the world that his word is good.
I wonder if General Odierno's position is based on two facts: the withdrawal will be unpopular with some and hard for all involved; and he's due to be reassigned in something like a year.
By kicking the can 14 months down the road he can skip out on all of the heavy lifting.
Violence is down more than the most optimistic hopes: According to this article the figure is at least 99.6% in the past three months.
Considering what happened to his own son, odierno has hardly been skipping out on the heavy lifting.
yes, there's always another corner to turn before we can withdraw. Will Obama EVER say no as President? We don't know yet, but this is a place to start?
sorry, no question mark intended to last sentence, this IS the place to start
I agree with you, Kevin, but is much accomplished if we remove troops from Iraq only to send them to Afghanistan?
Of course Odierno wants the troops to stick around. He's in charge of that theater of operations. Whoever is in charge will always push for more rather than fewer resources.
Reassign him to Afghanistan and see what he says then.
Well, hey, the Rapture's going to happen sometime soon so why not just wait until then?
Is Odierno being insubordinate? If the objective is to withdraw from Iraq, where did this contorted construction come from: "I believe that if we can get through the next year peacefully, with incidents about what they are today or better, I think we're getting close to enduring stability, which enables us to really reduce,"
Did that formulation come down the chain of command from Obama? If not, where did all these conditions get inserted? Gates? Petraeus?
Who is trying to prolong this war?
Well, 2 brigades _is_ a start. And 16 months takes us 2 months past Odierno's March 2010 projection for major drawdowns. 24 months (Kevin's acceptable fudge factor) takes us into 2011. I don't think there's as much daylight between Obama's promises and Odierno's scenario as Kevin seems to see, and it's awfully early to feed the meme of Obama backtracking.
He might be arguing for 'more' in his area of command, but is he arguing for a very slow approach which never gets there, so the next Republican administration can continue the occupation?
If there are difficulties with the plan, then I would want some more opinions.
Let's see 2 or 3 more plan ideas without Odierno's handprint on them.
What the general seems amiss in is his duty to follow orders instead of hedging his bets. This is much as the same about the phoney question of going anolog or digital on TV, when the whole point of the qualatative content of the programmes is entirely missing in America from the peoples point of view. Get serious when it comes to environment folks. The fact that we are over the limit with CO2 in parts per million means that species are already dying from suffication because of lack of oxygen. The only real question is how long will it be before the beginning of the planets death throwes reaches our specie??? The answer is simple, it already has and on still summer days takes thousands of live in the major cities even now and has done so for decades. The Bush administration has busied itself hiring scientists at more than twice the going rate to dumb down the stats. That is deliberately lie about whats going on. Now the General being discussed seems to think there is not rush to save the planets livability. This all starts from U.S. bull, about how they are the best in everything and the G.O.P. constantly puts out for public consumption. In truth we are being assaulted every day of every year and the world is going down. (Greepeace Pittsburg says that tens of thousands of Americans are dying each year that Georg Ws energy policy is in place, a fact for which they were arrested and put in jail.) If Obama was wiser and more truth was put to his governance he would withdraw those troops from Iraq and put them to retooling the econmony to the renewables immediately, as IVAW, code pink, and the majority of the American anti-war movement says ( constant 70%), and that is immediately it seems Americanss are so diseffected that they let politics linger in the unbelievable sector of human consciousness and lag behind the actual needs of the ecological green balances that are required for life on the planet to go on living. The Pentagon has worst world record for that kind of fault. Every war machine literally kills the planets life not only by shooting it do death, but also on how it is motivated by coal, gas, oil, and atomic energy. For it to move it kills life. The real Mother Jones spent long sojourns in jail realizing that the first industrial revolution was harmful to life of herself as well as all the childrem she saved from the factories of source pollution. Seeing as the majority of Americans are workers , it follows then that those that imposed the laws of labour efficiency on the peoples without reguard to the environment that they had to work in , would not have much reason to rush now to implement the just cause of the living working world today. Get serious or do you still have to wait untill the workers are droping in the city streets from lack of oxygen??? The Military defeats of American Imperialism in both Indo-China and the Holyland are precisely the destruction of the living ecological world and excessive shooting said world to death as well as motion. All we have is matter-in-motion it is way overdue that Americans started caring about the content of their practice instead of the size of their wallets for holding greenbacks. A ruling class that does not serve the people should be altered or abolished and replaced with one that does serve the people, plants, and animals--- the livability of the planet. Says the U.S. Constitution. No wonder the world lis depreessed with such slugo super-power being foisted on it by guns that shoot first and ask questions later. There is a world economy, start using it rather than destroying it with Empirist motives. By the way Bush's electronic laws have been used to shut down my e-mails and my connections by commputer to the world, wide web. I hope that Obama can cancell w's spying laws on peaceful citzens as I live in Canada and do not relish outside interference in my living and working space. Change yes we can.
Show Odierno the door. He's made no secret of the fact that he doesn't support the President in this regard -- extending even into last year during the election -- a huge departure from the reticence we deserve from a serving officer.
The time is now to begin the process of reminding the services that they have not become a defacto new branch of government. They serve. There's a reason we say that.
It's amusing that the NYT positions this as "keep a campaign promise" versus "alienate the generals".
What about, you know, not fucking up things in Iraq?
it's just more Obama lapdoggery from the establishment press.
Odierno is giving his opinion as one with a good view of the situation. While it was not a good idea to invade in the first place, once you depose the government and occupy the country, you have a responsibility to administer it, as the wise Bush, Sr., told us.
Probably the best we can hope for is leaving Iraq with ethnic tensions defused and a government that without American pressure will soon begin to show its corruption, anti-Americanism, and anti-democratic nature; but we owe it to the people of Iraq to at least quell the violence before we leave.
Read Tom Ricks's _Fiasco_: Odierno is a buffoon, probably the worst general we ever had in Iraq. Except for Franks.
I seem to remember that Gerneral Odierno in Thomas Ricks' "Fiasco" served as a subordinate to Gen. Patraeus and was quite slow in willingness to learn counter-insurgency techniques Patraeus was teaching based on his research and writings. Odierno continued to kick down doors and harass Iraqi citizens long after doctrine was quite clear that such techniques hurt much more than they helped. I was quite surprised when he was posted as Patraeus' deputy and horrified when he was given command in Iraq. It has always seemed to me he was exactly the wrong man for command, even though he was just right for 43, whose willingness to act the bully knew no ends. - Ted
Ordierno generally gets the blame for 1)creating insurgents via rough tactics based on zero operational intelligence
2)filling Abu Grabib with so many bystanders via cordon and sweep that the MPs were overwhelmed 3)moving slowly on counter insurgency
That being said, if I was in charge of withdrawal I would probably be saying the same thing since it could become on giant clusterfuck
The whole question is moot. At some point in the next year or two the Iraqi government will tell us it wants the rest of the troups out, and they will go. Anyone who doesn't understand that is pretty out of touch the realities of the situation.
Memo
From: The American People
To: President Obama
Faster, please.
+++
Memo
From: The President
To: Gen. R. Odierno
The people have spoken. Send your plan for a faster withdrawal. On my desk by Monday.
Odierno doesn't seem to understand the concept of Commander-in-Chief.
His OPINION is his to make to the C-in-C, not to the media. In the media he is required to follow orders (see General McArthur).
Fire this guy's ass or transfer him to General in Charge of Trash Hauling.
Insubordination is a court-martial offense.
Hard to overstate the extent to which this all delights me. With the burden of office upon him, Mr. Obama has decided to listen to the grownups, and naturlly the children will whine. Whine away, you stupes.
Hang the fucker for war crimes.
Guantanamo detainees held hostage, Day 11.
If you had half a clue, the man that is incharge of afghanistan was in O's seat. Go back to sleep.
I know that all here, regardless of political persuasion, will want to congratulate the Iraqi people on their successful election today. And of course all men of good will will join in expressing gratitude to George W. Bush, The Liberator, for making it all possible.