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Abizaid seeks more combat troops for Iraq
General John Abizaid, the commander of US forces in the Middle East, has asked the Pentagon for two additional combat brigades in response to the widespread rebellion in Iraq, reversing a year-long trend of reducing the US military presence there. The request for new troops highlights how the week-long revolt is forcing the US to rethink its security strategy.

Pentagon officials had been aiming to hand over an increasing share of security to Iraqi units and cut troop levels to 115,000 after the recent rotation of US forces. There are currently 135,000 American troops in Iraq. But Gen Abizaid on Monday acknowledged that US-trained Iraqi security forces - including police, civil defence units and the new Iraqi army - had performed poorly. "That was a great disappointment to us," he said.
They weren't willing to shoot their own people even if their own were acting uncivilized. That shouldn't surprise us.
Amid the growing concerns over the US strategy in Iraq, as well as criticism of the White House over its posture on terrorism before the September 11 attacks, President George W. Bush said on Monday he would hold a press conference Tuesday evening to answer the questions now inundating his administration.

Gen Abizaid declined to comment on how many troops there would be in the new deployment, saying the details are still being discussed with the joint staff, the senior military leadership. But he said the new forces he sought would have a "strong mobile combat arms capability" amounting to "two brigades of combat power, if not more".

There have been repeated calls in Washington by critics of the the Bush administration for additional troops in light of the unrest. The failure of indigenous Iraqi forces during the revolt could further complicate US efforts to reduce its presence, which the Pentagon's civilian leadership originally hoped would be in the tens of thousands by now. "It's still going to take a significant amount of time to ensure that they are properly equipped, properly trained and credible and capable," said Lt Gen Ricardo Sanchez, head of coalition ground forces in Iraq. US commanders plan to embed US special forces with some Iraqi security units.

Gen Abizaid said there has been a push for senior officers from the old Iraqi military, disbanded last year, to take command positions. The move appeared to reverse elements of the US de-Baathification policy. "In the next couple of days, you'll see a large number of senior officers being appointed to key positions in the ministry of defence and in the Iraqi joint staff and in Iraqi field commands," Gen Abizaid said. "I can tell you the competition for these positions has been fierce."
Chief Wiggles wrote about these generals at some length last year. He found some (not all) of them to be good people and thought they should be restored to their jobs. I hope he and Abizaid are right, 'cause I don't want the fox to get into the henhouse.

Posted by: Steve White 2004-04-13
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=30375