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November 12, 2005
I scooped the New York Times: We start pulling out in 2006
So the entire blogosphere missed the biggest story of the week, as did all of the newspapers, and both Senators Kerry and McCain: The Pentagon announced on November 8th that they would be reducing the number of American troops in 2006 down to about 92,000.
I more or less expected the papers to miss this. They've never quite gotten the war on terror, or understood exactly how the “rotation plan” works; the Pentagon was able to slip a troop increase of about 30,000 troops past them this quarter. But two of the most famous Senators spent the week arguing back and forth about what troop levels should be. Much ado about nothing? No, much ado about ignorance! I've always assumed that Senators had access to better (classified) information then me. I guess I was wrong...
Kerry said we should cut troop levels by 30,000 troops in Iraq by the end of the year. Um, Senator, there are currently 170,000 troops in Iraq, up from 140,000 prior to September. The Pentagon quietly raised the number of troops in Iraq for the October and December elections by overlapping the OIF-4 rotations against the OIF-3 rotations. That overlap ends in the first quarter of 2006, so the US was already going to reduce forces by 30,000 troops. This is so typical of Kerry. I think he has CEO disease; he gets a briefing and thinks it is his idea. “Bush should be doing exactly what he..er..is doing”, he'll thunder.
Meanwhile, McCain gave a speech to counter Kerry, saying we needed more troops in Iraq. Well, I agree with that, I just don't think they should be US troops, they should be Iraqi troops. We're training 7-10,000 new troops a month in Iraqi. Those troops are about 3-4 times more effective then our own troops; after all, its their country. So by the end of the year, when we rotate those 30,000 troops home, there will be more then enough Iraqi troops to replace them. By August, we'll have 270,000 Iraqi troops in Iraq, which compares well to the previous regime which had more troops, but they were inadequately trained. Saddam didn't even provide food or uniforms for half of them.
As for how I caught this when the press missed it, remember how I suspected that we were planning on reducing forces in Iraq in 2006? Then there was this announcement by the DOD of the new troop rotations? And then I noticed that the UN mandate has been extended through 2006, but that the Iraqis have the ability to cut it short if they want?
At first, I thought maybe I was getting it wrong, so I talked to a couple of people and they just sort of shrugged. Then I watched a newsreport by the internal DOD news channel saying it and I thought “aha!”. Finally, I asked the DOD directly and they confirmed it:
The story about the 92,000 troop rotation for 2006 seems to be implying that we'll be drawing down our troops in 2006.
This briefing makes it more explicit.
Can I have confirmation that this is true? This seems like pretty big news.
We can confirm that the plan is, in fact, to reduce the size of Coalition Forces in country in 2006. It's big news inasmuch as the Iraqis are increasing the size and strength of their footprint and, by the same token, we're reducing ours.
As we've stated in the past, rotation planning is flexible, conditions-based and operationally focused; it is not based on timetables or political pressures. The coalition is committed to assisting Iraq while Iraq works to achieve political stability and the maintenance of a secure environment.
How was I able to read the tea leaves that the New York Times and the Washington Post missed? Simple. I've always understood the war plan.
The war plan, for good or ill has never been to occupy the country. It's always been the plan for the Iraqis to provide security in their own country. In other words, do the exact opposite of what we did in Vietnam:
- Instead of installing a puppet government, we've spent 2.5 years building up an Iraqi one.
- Instead of having 500,000 troops and 60,000 casualties from trying to take over Vietnam, we've 170,000 troops but only 2,000 casualties because we weren't trying to take over.
In other words, instead of going into Iraq and trying to run the country like we did in Vietnam (Step 1 install a Christian leader in a Buddhist country? What idiot thought up that one?), we've done the minimal amount of work to keep Iraq in a holding pattern until the Iraqis could run it.
It's pretty simple really, and it's actually not a bad plan. I think the US has learned the lessons of Vietnam and Somalia; let people run their own countries. The main mistake we made in this whole war was thinking that it wouldn't take most of 2004 to train the Iraqi Police and Army. It just takes time to do that kind of thing.
Once you understand the war plan, the minute the number of Iraqi Police started to pass the number of US troops, it was obvious we were going to be able to draw our own troops down. With the 210,000 Iraqis, plus the 170,000 US troops, there are 380,000 troops working towards security in Iraq, the most we've ever had. So I was looking for troop reductions, and I found it. By August, with 270,000 Iraqi troops and 92,000 US troops, 3/4 of the troops in Iraq will be Iraqis, and the US may not be needed at all. Hence the provision in the 2006 mandate to end the presence of coalition forces early if need be.
So there you go, spread the word. Be sure to read Defining the Victory Conditions so you can realize that our pulling out troops is a sure sign of success in Iraq, and you can read: Route Irish has Improved if you want to see how much more effective the Iraqis are then our own troops. For one thing, not only do all Iraqis speak the language, but they can recognize someone who doesn't belong the same way a Flagstaff resident can see a Phoenician a mile away. (Phoenician being a tourist from Phoenix.)
Update:
Welcome Instapundit readers. As you can see, I originally noticed this on the 12th of November, so its been a weird week for me listening to the debates about all this. Looks like the media has caught up though. Here's an interesting interview with the Marine commander in Fallujah, he says the Iraqis could take over there in 6 months.
Update #2: Wow, Glenn linked me twice. Mudville Gazette has looked at the same stuff here. Like me, he concludes that troop reductions may be coming but they may not be down to 92,000.
For new readers to my blog if you like what you see, you may be interested in:
Brookings which is all my coverage of the Brookings Institution's Iraq Index reports.
Debunking Iraq Myths where I lay out a moderate position on Iraq.
Friction where I discuss “Why Iraq?”
Bush Lied, People Died, Er, Kinda where I talk about that meme.
Ground Truth are pieces that provide information on how the war in Iraq is going from either soldiers or Iraqis.
Warning, I do consider myself a moderate on the war. I don't think Bush was totally straightforward, I don't think he could be. I do think Iraq was necessary. All my foreign policy pieces are here.
Posted by the at November 12, 2005 8:21 AM
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Comments
Pulling out?! That doesn’t sound very manly to me.
Posted by: Clay at November 17, 2005 10:34 PM
Funny, funny…..
So I found this article late last night and it’s even more telling. A GOP ploy to make the Dems look bad about “pulling out.” Funny part is it doesn’t matter anyway!
Posted by: Jon the neighbor at November 19, 2005 4:42 AM
Like you, we were aware of this story and commented on it several times at our blog:
and Talking like McCain, doing like Kerry
In fact, Centcom officers were discussing lower troop levels last summer.
The problem for the Bush administration is convincing everyone, once lower troop levels occur next year, that it is a result of success, and not abandonment.
Posted by: westhawk ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.opinionatedbastard.com/nav-commenters.gif)
at November 19, 2005 4:37 PM
Cool. Glad to know others can read the tea leaves too!
You may like my post Defining the Victory Conditions then.
Posted by: Opinionated Bastard at November 19, 2005 4:46 PM
Excellent post. I wish more people would read it.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at November 19, 2005 8:49 PM
Dear Opinionated Bastard:
We read your post “Defining the Victory Conditions.” We agree that Iraq will certainly be a violent place. The MSM and war opponents will describe this condition as a symbol of the failure of OIF. On the other hand, the MSM may lose interest in the story once U.S. troops are on their way home.
We won’t know for a decade or more how the Iraq project will turn out. But for now, the two main U.S. victory conditions are:
1) An Iraqi government that can defend itself against overthrow from Al Qaeda or the Baathists,
2) A situation where U.S. special operators can continue the pursuit of Al Qaeda personnel.
Iranian capture of the Iraqi political process remains a concern and would constitute a defeat for the U.S. In this case, or should the new Iraqi government prove completely ineffective, the U.S. could attempt to pursue its main goal, disrupting Al Qaeda, by clandestinely allying with friendly militias in Iraq to continue that hunt (a hunt under these conditions could be a cross-border affair. For more on this topic see our post Open range-the war without borders ).
The war against Al Qaeda is the primary U.S. interest. Everything else at this point is a means for doing this.
Posted by: westhawk at November 20, 2005 9:10 AM
I’m a little less worried about Iranian capture of the political process then you. For one thing, one man one vote but multiple times will tend to defeat that; even in Iran the new hardline president got chastised after his rant about Israel because the people feel he needs to be working about Iranian problems.
So as long as the constitution stays how it is, in 10 years we’re pretty much gaurunteed a practical government. Voters don’t rant.
Posted by: Opinionated Bastard at November 21, 2005 8:18 AM
Seems to me that the Dems understand full well the war plan—that is why they are trying to get ahead of the parade by making the troop drawdown appear to be a result of their pressure on the administration. Since unlike the MSM, the Democrat leadership (as much as I like to think they are STUPID) know the true situation on the ground in Iraq and how the troops view the war. I think they know that Bush isn’t about to cave, especially since he knows that victory is near. Its the Republican Senators who are the weenies in this whole business.
Posted by: Don at November 21, 2005 5:12 PM
You use the phrase “3-4 times more effective” to describe the Iraqi troops. Do you have a basis for this, or is it just a general impression?
Posted by: David at November 21, 2005 5:58 PM
Don’t confuse rotation plans with the simple fact that we have sent in many additional troops to help keep an election taking place.That said, over and over we hear from people who ought to know that we simply do not have sufficient forces there at present. Yes—we may withdraw next year or so. But that ils because more Iraqi forces should (we hope) be ready to replace them, and the election will be over. But thesea re big “ifs”
Posted by: postroad at November 21, 2005 6:57 PM
I don’t have a concrete basis for the more effective, but I got that impression from pieces like this:
Posted by: Opinionated Bastard at November 22, 2005 7:56 AM
So, when are the troops being drawn down? I haven’t heard anything but lip service as of yet. I personally believe, as the violence continues to rage, we won’t see any significant numbers of troops taken out of Iraq. Unless of course we march them on toward Iran. Now wouldn’t that be a novel idea?
Posted by: Eric Tsetsi at January 16, 2006 1:07 PM
Well, I said August originally…
If the troops are serving 1-year hitches in Iraq, and the rotation plan calls for fewer troops to rotate in after a year, and they’ve even announced some of those won’t have to rotate in, that’s a troop drawdown.
But they’re not “pulling” troops, they’re just not “replacing” them. So don’t expect to see pictures of troops on the news boarding planes. Johnny GI comes home, but Jack GI isn’t replacing him. That’s not as good a news photo, but that’s how it works.
Posted by: Opinionated Bastard at January 17, 2006 6:11 AM
Well, if troops were in fact serving 1 year hitches in Iraq you would be right but in reality troops are serving three and a possible fourth tour. This is one of the reasons why more troops are coming home mentally broken. Also, in your piece you don’t recognize that Vietnam lasted about ten years. In the first couple of years of Vietnam, American millitary deaths were approximately the same as what we’ve seen in Iraq so far.
I am of the opinion that we won’t be going anywhere anytime soon. Even if we do end up drawing troop levels down, which is ultimately what you are talking about, I think we will keep a ground presence (in addition to a robust air presence) in Iraq to stop a civil war. If we do this, deaths will increase.
Posted by: Eric Tsetsi at January 17, 2006 7:21 AM
