Top general quoting Iraqis"You know, we were a lot more secure and safe during the Saddam regime"

[dajoki]

Big boost in Iraqi forces is urged
A top general sees years before U.S. ends security role

By Walter Pincus and Ann Scott Tyson
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19197080/

Updated: 6:17 a.m. ET June 13, 2007
WASHINGTON - A senior U.S. military commander said yesterday that Iraq's army must expand its rolls by at least 20,000 more soldiers than Washington had anticipated, to help free U.S. troops from conducting daily patrols, checkpoints and other critical yet dangerous missions.

Even then, Iraq will remain incapable of taking full responsibility for its security for many years -- five years in the case of protecting its airspace -- and will require a long-term military relationship with the United States, said Lt. Gen. Martin Dempsey, who until recently led the U.S. military's training effort in Iraq.

<<snip>>

His projection of the size of the police force required to help bring stability -- 195,000 -- is more than 40 percent higher than Washington estimated in 2003. The remarks follow other blunt comments by U.S. military commanders that civilian deaths and attacks on U.S. troops have recently risen and that particularly tough fighting is expected in the coming months.

<<snip>>

Describing the U.S. effort in Iraq as a labor of Sisyphus, he said the metaphoric stone is "probably rolling back a bit right now in Baghdad. But I don't think it's going to roll over us."

‘Mind-numbing’ violence tolerated
Dempsey depicted the level of violence tolerated by Iraqis as "mind-numbing" and acknowledged that a dearth of security has made some Iraqis nostalgic for the rule of Saddam Hussein, who was ousted by the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. "You'll hear people say, 'You know, we were a lot more secure and safe during the Saddam regime,' " he told the oversight panel of the House Armed Services Committee.

[Supersedeas]

1. Years of commitment to the Bush Occupation -- Oil tycoons must be smiling as they

puff their Cubans.