December 16, 2006

By DAVID E. SANGER and MICHAEL R. GORDON
WASHINGTON, Dec. 15 — Military planners and White House budget analysts have been asked to provide President Bush with options for increasing American forces in Iraq by 20,000 or more. The request indicates that the option of a major “surge” in troop strength is gaining ground as part of a White House strategy review, senior administration officials said Friday.

Discussion of increasing the number of American troops, at least temporarily, has coursed through Washington for two months, as a possible way to reverse the deteriorating security situation in Baghdad. But the decision to ask the Joint Chiefs of Staff to specify where the additional forces could be found among overstretched Army, Marine and National Guard units, and to seek a cost estimate from the White House Office of Management and Budget, signifies a turn in the debate.

Officials said that the options being considered included the deployment of upwards of 50,000 additional troops, but that the political, training and recruiting obstacles to an increase larger than 20,000 to 30,000 troops would be prohibitive.

At present, only about 17,000 American soldiers are actively involved in the effort to secure Baghdad, so even the low end of the proposals being considered by military and budget officials could more than double the size of that force. If adopted, such an increase would be a major departure from the current strategy advocated by Gen. George W. Casey Jr., which has stressed stepping up the training of Iraqi forces and handing off to them as soon as possible.

The details of the plan under study by the White House are not known, but in most scenarios the troop increase would be accomplished in large part by accelerating some scheduled deployments while delaying the departure of units in Iraq.

President Bush has made no final decision, the White House said. Gordon Johndroe, the National Security Council spokesman, said that no memorandums outlining the options for increasing troop strength had gone to the president. But one senior official said the subject was discussed at length on Wednesday during Mr. Bush’s briefing at the Pentagon, and the president has reportedly asked detailed questions that some officials have interpreted as suggesting that he is strongly leaning in that direction.

American military officials said Friday night that the Pentagon was planning to send the Second Brigade of the 82nd Airborne Division to Kuwait in January. The brigade, based at Fort Bragg, N.C., would serve as a reserve that commanders in Iraq could draw on.

American military commanders have been operating without such a reserve since the Marine unit that had been on call was dispatched to Anbar Province in western Iraq. The Army brigade could become an element of a larger troop deployment to Iraq if the White House decided to increase troops there.

That option has been central to a broader debate in Washington. Advocates of a troop increase say the aim would be to reverse the slide toward an all-out civil war and give the new Iraqi government more time to consolidate control, while training of Iraqis is stepped up.

At the same time, American and Iraqi forces would try to tamp down strife in neighborhoods that contain Shiites and Sunnis, and slow insurgent attacks. To be effective, proponents say, these tactics would need to be married to a broader political and economic strategy to generate employment in Baghdad and stabilize Iraq.

Critics of a surge approach have argued that any American troop increase would lead to more American casualties and merely put off the day when the Iraqis need to assume responsibility for their own security.

There is also concern that the military benefits would be short-lived unless the higher troop levels were sustained for a long period, adding to the strain on American forces. Alternatively, critics say, if the surge in troop levels was too brief, adversaries could simply wait for the reinforcements to leave.

Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, said during a visit to Baghdad this week that American military commanders were discussing the possibility of adding as many as 10 more combat brigades — a maximum of about 35,000 troops — to establish some of control while Iraq’s divided political leaders seek solutions to the mounting violence.

On Friday, however, one administration official said that additional work was needed to fit a troop increase into the larger strategy, as well as on technical aspects about how the operation would be carried out. “There has not been a full articulation of what we would want the surge to accomplish,” he said.

Strikingly, the surge proposal has not been actively promoted by the top commander in Iraq. General Casey, the senior American commander in Baghdad, has emphasized faster training of Iraqi security forces, an effort that would be supported in part by converting existing combat forces into trainers.

Gen. John P. Abizaid, the top American commander in the Middle East, has said that the advantages of a surge in troop levels would be temporary, and that it might dissuade Iraqis from doing more to provide for their own security.

Some of the chiefs of the services that would supply forces for the surge have spoken about it in hedged terms. “We would not surge without a purpose,” Peter J. Schoomaker, the Army chief of staff, told reporters on Thursday. “And that purpose should be measurable.”

But Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, who is assuming day-to-day command of American troops in Iraq from Lt. Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli, is said to be sympathetic to the idea.

The surge proposal has also gained greater support among recently retired officers who served in Iraq, particularly if carried out as part of a broader political and economic strategy.

Two retired Army veterans who served in the unit that took control of the northern Iraqi city of Tal Afar in 2005 — Col. Joel Armstrong and Maj. Daniel Dwyer — helped draft a new study issued Thursday by the American Enterprise Institute that called for sending an additional four or five combat brigades, or some 14,000 to 17,500 troops, to Baghdad.

The study determined that the military could sustain a surge of that level, but that it would require sending several Army brigades back to Iraq a couple of months early and extending the customary yearlong Army tour to 15 months.

In its report last week, the bipartisan Iraq Study Group rejected the idea of a “substantial” force increase on the order of 100,000 to 200,000 troops, saying that those levels were not “available for a sustained deployment” and would feed fears in Iraq that the United States was planning a long-term occupation.

“We could, however, support a short-term redeployment or surge of American combat forces to stabilize Baghdad,” the report added, “or to speed up the training and equipping mission, if the U.S. commander in Iraq determines that such steps would be effective.”

Bush Speaks With Maliki

WASHINGTON, Dec. 15 — President Bush held a videoconference with the Iraqi prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, on Friday, the eve of a Baghdad conference aimed at cooling sectarian violence.

At the conference, Kurdish, Shiite and Sunni Arab politicians are expected to discuss a reconciliation plan that includes possible amnesty for insurgent fighters and proposals to curb militia violence.

White House officials said Mr. Bush spoke by secure video with Mr. Maliki for roughly half an hour.

Gordon Johndroe, a spokesman for the National Security Council, said Mr. Maliki talked about his desire “for a larger core of Iraqi political leaders to come together for the common objective of stabilizing Iraq.” The Bush administration has been encouraging Mr. Maliki to rely less on the radical Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr.

I am perplexed at the short-sighted position of not engaging Iran and/or Syria.

One thing is for sure, we will not forge any common interest by keeping away from the negotiating table from the leaders of either Syria or Iran. Typically Syria can be 'bought' and the Iranians, ... well they will be the Iranians which is a highly nationalistic nation with a youth population that is the majority which generally loves the west regardless of what the media might present.

Iran is a Shia dominated country, and the Syrians are a Sunni dominated country. Their alliance is more fragile than we might think.

The great advantage of coming to the table with both parties, both individually and/or together is to propagate the 'soft kill' which is to 'SPEAK OVER THE LEADERS TO THE IRANIAN PEOPLE" and hopefully be more effective than Ackmanijin's efforts to speak over President Bush to the American people to win the media war.

The reality is the the Iranian Prez is in serious political trouble and is constantly making noise in the international community to deflect attention on his own economy and the continued restriction of liberties in his country which include limiting broadband internet as well as 'purging' the Universities of 'liberal' professors who dont' fall in line with the strict 'Sharia' law which keeps control over the people.

This is a strategy that will fail, it will only take time. The power of global connectivity is simply much stronger that restrictive policies which limit people's economic and social freedoms.

Many Iranian young people are flying and moving to Dubai, which is less than an hours flight from Tehran, because jobs and captial investment in Iran is on the downward trend.

The idea of connectivity with the populace is what President Bush can do by engaging the leaderships of both countries.

We have much to be proud of.
Our economy is rolling along, our unemployment is among lowest periods in history while Irans is 4 or 5 times higher!

Our military is more advanced.
Our personal freedoms are years ahead.
Women have much greater opps that Irananian women.

We should quietly promote and even taunt middle eastern gov't at the failure of their systems.

We should offer 'one laptop' per child as Hugo Chavez offered oil to the poor.
We should look at what a billion dollars of a week in Iraq could do if we looked at the soft kill as important a viable first step to the need for military action.

By LEE KEATH, Associated Press WriterFri Dec 15, 2:21 PM ET
Sen. John Kerry, on a Mideast tour taking him to Damascus for talks with President Bashar Assad, said Friday that the Bush administration's rejection of dialogue with Syria and Iran to try to calm Iraq is a mistake.

Kerry's trip is the latest in a growing tussle between the White House and Congress over the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group, a bipartisan panel that called for talks with Iran and Syria to win their help in stabilizing war-torn Iraq.

The Massachusetts Democrat said his visit to Syria was "a fact-finding mission" to explore "what might or might not affect behavior with respect to Hezbollah, Lebanon, Israel and Iraq, where in each of those cases Syria is playing a role."

"Dialogue is an important thing. It's very hard to move the ball if you don't know firsthand what people's needs are, what their own perceptions are," Kerry said in an interview with The Associated Press and several other journalists in Cairo.

Kerry said he was "willing" to go to Iran for talks but had no current plans to do so.

The White House said Thursday that trips to Syria by U.S. lawmakers were "inappropriate," giving a public relations victory for Damascus, which the Bush administration accuses of fueling crises in Iraq, Lebanon and the Palestinian territories.

Spokesman Tony Snow said a visit earlier this week by Sen. Bill Nelson (news, bio, voting record), D-Fla. to Damascus, Kerry's visit and others planned by Democrat Christopher Dodd and Republican Arlen Specter send a mixed message to Syria.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice soundly rejected any talks with Syria and Iran in an interview with The Washington Post, saying any "compensation" they demand would be too high and that they should act on their own if they want stability in Iraq.

Kerry called the refusal to talk to Syria and Iran "a mistake. I think it's the kind of policy that's got us into trouble in the reason and it needs to change."

The former Democratic presidential candidate underlined that he was not engaging in negotiations with Damascus. "Talking to somebody is not rewarding their behavior. I have no illusions about our differences with these countries ... and nothing in the discussion is based on trust," said. "But you cannot get to (action and verifiability) without setting up the modalities. So you have to engage in some dialogue."

"Now that the Democrats are in control of Congress, we have an even larger responsibility to set a direction ... as a counterbalance to policies that have gotten us into trouble," he said.

Kerry, who met Thursday with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, was heading to Jordan, then to Iraq. He visits Damascus early next week, where he will hold talks with Assad. He also planned stops in Lebanon, Israel and the West Bank in the nine-day tour.

Syria has influence with Iraqi Sunnis and some leaders of the Sunni-led insurgency are believed to be based on its soil. Iran in turn is closely linked to Shiite parties in the government and some of the militias blamed for killing thousands of Sunnis in Iraq's sectarian violence.

by Sabah JergesFri Dec 15, 1:10 PM ET
Iraqi leaders have offered an olive branch to former members of ousted dictator Saddam Hussein's ruling party in a bid to kickstart a program of national reconciliation, lawmakers said.

A small number of former Baath Party members are expected to attend the start of peace talks in Baghdad on Saturday, they said, as Iraq's embattled coalition government seeks to drag the country out of a vicious sectarian war.

The move will raise hackles among hardline Shiite militants, whose majority community was persecuted by Saddam's Sunni-led regime, but is seen by many observers as a key first step in calming the violent insurgency.

Tens of thousands of Baathists and Saddam-era military officers were purged from public service in the aftermath of the March 2003 US-led invasion and many went on to swell the ranks of groups fighting the new Shiite-led government.

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has been cautious about revealing details of the peace talks, especially as some Shiite politicians have threatened a boycott if senior Baathists "with blood on their hands" attend.

But there is a growing consensus that more junior party members not proven to have supported Saddam-era atrocities or the post-invasion rebellion should be allowed into the political process as a gesture of reconciliation.

Nasser al-Ani, a Sunni lawmaker and the official spokesman of the conference, confirmed that Baathists living abroad were among those invited.

"Probably some Baathists will attend," he said. "At the very least they will send representatives.

"The names of attendes will be announced during the conference. We invited personalities from abroad and some might come, but most gave excuses, citing security concerns," he told AFP.

On Thursday, Maliki's spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh confirmed that the talks would be open to all-comers, without specifically mentioning Baathists.

"Dialogue shall be held with all. We shall hold talks with anyone who wants to build Iraq," he said.

Abbas al-Bayati, a member Iraq's dominant Shiite parliamentary bloc, went further, adding that many Baathists might be allowed to return to their former positions in government, universities and state-run companies.

"Individual Baathists will participate," he confirmed. "They will explain their point of view and their positions."

"The conference will limit the number of those to whom the law of de-Baathification applies to 2,000 people. The other former Baathists will either be considered retired and receive pensions or can get their old jobs back," he said.

There has been no discussion of removing Iraq's constitutional ban on the Baath Party as a political entity, but individual former members may be allowed back into a civil service starved of their administrative experience.

Even supporters of radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, one of Saddam's fiercest opponents, have softened their stance slightly.

Sahib al-Amer, a Sadrist lawmaker, said the party would boycott any talks attended by violent supporters of Saddam and Sunni extremists, but left open the chance of meetings with repentant lower-level party members.

"There is a stand for the Sadr bloc which has already announced. We will boycott the conference if Baathists, Saddamists and Takfiris whose hands are bloodstained attend. This position has not changed," he announced.

Two months after the US invasion toppled Saddam's regime, the then US proconsul in Iraq, Paul Bremer, decreed laws dissolving the national army and banning 30,000 Baath Party members, including 6,000 teachers, from state employment.

That move has since become seen as a mistake by most observers, who argue that it fed the ranks of the insurgency and embittered Iraq's Sunni minority, besides removing skilled administrators.

Ironically, it is now US officials -- anxious to bring an end to a war which has bogged down 140,000 American troops -- who are leading calls for Maliki to reverse the de-Baathification process and appease Iraq's warring factions.

Officials said the conference will begin at around 10:00 am (0700 GMT) on Saturday and involve around 300 delegates from various political factions.

Iraq was relatively peaceful on Friday, the Muslim day of weekly prayers, in the build-up to Iraq's appearance in the finals of the Asian Games football tournament, and event which briefly united the nation in support for the team.

Sporadic violence was reported from some parts of the country, however, including the southern city of Basra, where police reported a tribal leader and three of his bodyguards shot dead in a local feud.

By Gerry J. Gilmore
American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON, Dec. 15, 2006 – The commander of a U.S. Army brigade that partners with and trains Iraqi soldiers and police in Iraq's Diyala province today praised the recent actions of local security forces and civilians there.

Terrorists in Diyala province continue to try to destabilize the democratic Iraqi government through the use of improvised explosive devices, snipers, kidnappings and threats to innocent Iraqis, Col. David Sutherland, commander of the 3rd Brigade Combat Team, told Pentagon reporters during a satellite-carried news conference from his headquarters in Baqubah, Iraq.

"However, it does not mean that they have won the battle there; in fact, far from it," Sutherland said of the terrorists' efforts in his area of operations.

Iraqi soldiers and police in his area aren't being cowed by the terrorists' actions, Sutherland said. "The Iraqi people are responding with great courage," he said, noting he'd recently witnessed bravery by a detachment of Iraqi police at a checkpoint who came under insurgents' small-arms fire.

"These men were low on ammunition, food and water, but they did not break," Sutherland said of the Iraqi police. "They stood their post, stood their post diligently."

Since assuming responsibility for security operations in Diyala province in early November, Sutherland said, his soldiers have been busy training Iraqi soldiers and police while taking the fight to extremists.

"Second, we are conducting stability and reconstruction operations to help the people of Iraq build a new life and a stable and secure environment," the colonel said.

Sutherland said his troops work closely with Iraqi police and soldiers. "This is a cooperative relationship. Coalition forces provide assistance and planning, logistics and operations, but increasingly, it is the Iraqi security forces that are in the lead," he said.

Diyala province is about the size of Maryland and has an ethnically-mixed population of about 1.5 million people, Sutherland said. The province is so ethically diverse, he said, that it is known as "Little Iraq."

Agriculture is the province's main industry, he said, noting the region's date harvest was up 75 percent from a year earlier, while its rice production jumped 50 percent from a year ago.

Baqubah's open-air markets are open for business, Sutherland said, adding that the provincial government is functioning and doing its work. A notable provincial government program actively seeks to more fully engage the area's various tribal and ethnic groups in the political process. "This sort of initiative is critical to the long-term stability of the province," Sutherland said.

Iraqi security forces are developing new tactics to use against terrorists operating in the province, Sutherland said, while his troops continue to train local police and Iraqi soldiers. "We are dedicated to helping the Iraqi security forces become a professional force that treats people with respect and enforces the rule of law, a force that is non-sectarian, professional and devoted to the safety and security of all Iraqis in the province," Sutherland said.

Developing a multi-ethnic, democratic culture in a land that's only known dictatorship for decades isn't an easy task, and it will take time, the colonel said.

Yet, despite challenges, he said, the 3rd BCT's troops are working hard in Diyala province, teaching Iraqi army and police leaders "how to be good representatives working on behalf of their people."

Related Sites:
Multinational Force Iraq
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