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Pentagon to Call on More Support Troops
EFL
The Pentagon is drawing up plans to mobilize more National Guard and Reserve forces for duty in Iraq, in the expectation that too few international troops will be available by early next year, officials said Thursday. The additional reservists have not been notified because Pentagon planners have yet to decide which units to call on, and there remains a slim chance that international troops can be used instead. The extra forces - which could turn out to be a mixture of international troops, active-duty U.S. Marines and National Guard and Reserve soldiers - are to replace active-duty units due to return home. ``There are combat support and combat service support units in the reserve component that probably have not been notified yet,’’ Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at a news conference at the Pentagon with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. ``They will be notified in plenty of time to give them all the notification they need and all the training,’’ he added.

Some members of Congress said it was time to bring home some Guard and Reserve units already in Iraq. ``I’m getting uneasy on how much we’re calling on our Guard and Reserve units,’’ said Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss. ``You have to have some sort of rotation scheme for the men or women that are over there that’s a limit to how long they’ll stay. Then you have to bring in other people, other divisions or other National Guard or whatever.’’ A member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said, ``If we don’t ease the burden on the Guard and Reserves, we’re going to have retention problems.’’
So, you guys are willing to introduce the legislation for a couple new brigades of light infantry, eh?
The National Guard and Reserve units to which Myers referred are in addition to two infantry brigades - the 39th of the Arkansas National Guard and the 30th of the North Carolina National Guard - that have been mobilized and are scheduled to head to Iraq early next year. They will help replace two active-duty divisions - the 1st Armored and 1st Infantry. The Pentagon also has alerted - but not yet activated - the 81st Armor Brigade of the Washington State National Guard. In addition to those combat units, Myers said a number of Guard and Reserve support units would be needed if the Bush administration does not get enough troop contributions from Turkey and other international partners in time to deploy them early next year. At that point, the Army expects to send home the 101st Airborne Division, which will have been there a full year. In a report Thursday, WTVF-TV in Nashville, Tenn., quoted family members of 101st Airborne soldiers in Iraq as saying the soldiers have been told that some elements of the division will rotate back to their home base at Fort Campbell, Ky., between Dec. 15 and Jan. 1.

Rumsfeld said it was too early to say there will be insufficient numbers of international troops available by early next year, but he strongly suggested that time was not on the Pentagon’s side. U.S. officials are in discussion with several countries, including South Korea and Pakistan. Arrangements are being ironed out with Turkey, which has agreed to provide troops. ``Expecting something as complex as that to happen rapidly, I think probably is not likely,’’ Rumsfeld said. Rumsfeld welcomed the U.N. Security Council’s passage Thursday of a new resolution that authorizes a multinational military force in Iraq under a single command led by the United States. The resolution also calls for troop contributions and financial support from U.N. member states; Rumsfeld said it was not clear how many more troops will be offered as a result.
France: zero. Germany: zero. Belgium: zero.
Posted by: Steve White 2003-10-17
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=20000