Ranks in Iraq dangerously thin

[SoCalDem]

http://www.ajc.com/opinion/content/opinion/1004/28iraq.html
(reg req..but it's fast & easy)

Ranks in Iraq dangerously thin

Published on: 10/28/04


The Bush administration continues to claim that we have enough troops on the ground in Iraq and have always had enough troops.That simply is not true. In this as in so much else, the gap between what is real and what we are being asked to believe about Iraq is daunting.


The latest evidence of that shortcoming is the disappearance of 377 tons of high-yield explosives from an unguarded Iraqi military site soon after "major military operations" ended in Iraq in early April 2003. U.S. officials knew the site was there; they knew the explosives were there; they knew that in the wrong hands, those munitions could do terrible damage.

Yet we couldn't — or at least didn't — spare the troops to guard the place. It seems almost certain that the material was looted by insurgents after U.S. forces had taken control of the region, and many experts fear that those explosives are now being used to build the car bombs and other devices wreaking such havoc in Iraq. In fact, the tons of explosive material taken from Al-Qaqaa could supply the insurrection for years. It is yet another way in which the shortage of troops has contributed to unnecessary carnage, including the deaths of many U.S. soldiers.

That's not the only example, of course.
We didn't have enough troops to stop the rampant post-war looting that has set back reconstruction efforts by years. Apparently, only the Ministry of Oil was worth protecting.
We didn't have enough troops to hold Fallujah and other towns that we once controlled and are now being forced to retake at considerable political and military cost.
Today, we still don't have enough troops to close Iraq's borders and stop the influx of Islamic terrorists infiltrating from surrounding countries.

And why don't we have enough troops in Iraq?

snip???

[lightbulb]

1. The amount of troops required to stabilize a country

is inversely proportional to the support the troops have from that country's general citizenry. That said, another 2 million troops ought to do it.

[Sagan]

2. that's ok..

The Bushies can just photoshop more troops in...

[gratuitous]

3. Well, FEED them then

Golly, does George have to think of everything himself?!