Salon: Bush's "Drawdown" had to happen no matter what. Never enough troops to sustain any surge.

[BurtWorm]

Bush is spinning spinning his wheels as strategy. His only strategy has always been spin.



http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/09/13/bush_speech/print.html

According to a Thursday afternoon press release from the White House that contained excerpts from the speech, Bush will tell the nation:

"The premise of our strategy is that securing the Iraqi population is the foundation for all other progress ... The goal of the surge is to provide that security -- and to help prepare Iraqi forces to maintain it. As I will explain tonight, our success in meeting these objectives now allows us to begin bringing some of our troops home."

But that explanation doesn't jibe with the facts. No matter what the president or Gen. David Petraeus, the military point man of the surge, may now say about next spring's drawdown, it is not predicated on success. Bringing troops home is not a choice, but a fait accompli. It has been preordained since the beginning of the surge. In fact, the surge was always destined to end next spring because after that there will be no more troops with which to continue it, according to statements from Adm. Michael Mullen, the man Bush recently appointed as chairman of the military's Joint Chiefs of Staff, not to mention statements from Gen. Petraeus himself.

Many troops now in Iraq have already had their tours of duty extended to 15 months in order to participate in the surge. To continue the surge past next spring, the Pentagon would have to extend those tours even further. To do so would "break" the U.S. military, many experts have warned -- including Adm. Mullen. The administration has repeatedly indicated that those tours would not be extended.

Fred Kaplan, a reporter for Slate who once served as a foreign and defense policy advisor to former Rep. Les Aspin and has written extensively on the shortage of troops available for Iraq, said in an interview that the drawdown was destined to happen regardless of events on the ground in Iraq.

"The 15-month tours will be up," said Kaplan. "The Army was adamantly opposed to extending the tour beyond that there has not been any further mobilization of the Reserves ... So, you know, there's no choice. They've got to come home without any replacement.

"If Bush and all decision-makers had suddenly gone comatose and things were just allowed to run their natural course, this is exactly what would have happened."

[Cha]

1. And who's to say they didn't?..

"If Bush and all decision-makers had suddenly gone comatose and things were just allowed to run their natural course, this is exactly what would have happened."

[BurtWorm]

2. kick