White House Looking At 16, 19, 23-month Troop Withdrawal Options For Iraq

[Bluebear]

WASHINGTON (AFP) — The White House is weighing several options for US troop withdrawals from Iraq, with timetables ranging from President Barack Obama's campaign pledge to remove all combat troops within 16 months to a 23-month option, a defense official said.

A 19-month scenario was also presented to the president by military advisers at the White House's request, the official told AFP on condition of anonymity, confirming an earlier report by US-based McClatchy Newspapers.

"We know they would like to do it in 16 months" but "we presented a range of options and the risks associated with it," said a second defense official, who also requested anonymity.

The newspaper group said the White House had received assessments of the risks associated with the 16, 19 and 23-month troop withdrawal options.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5h-fFBCZxwH2u8ZvDL2MKhtCAqRhQ

[LakeSamish706]

1. Looks like were moving the goal posts from the original 16 months... n/t

[Jackpine Radical]

2. I got the crap stomped out of me around here yesterday

for daring to suggest that there might be substance to the moving-goalpost story.

Edited to add: In honor of my emotional bruises, I'm reposting my comment:

Obama doesn't want to be responsible for the "loss" of Iraq. Too bad. He doesn't have much choice. His only real choice is whether to get out early, save lives, and let it collapse early, or get out later, cost more lives, and wacth it collapse later. Iraq was on the verge of boiling over for decades. Saddam kept the lid on with brutal force, and kept the country from breaking apart into its natural constituents. Bush removed him and took over the lid-sitting job, with varying degrees of success, and at great cost in lives. Now Obama has inherited lid-tending duties. He can either keep the war going or say "Screw it" and get out, leaving it to boil over and exposing himself to excoriation by the Republicans and Liebermanites for having "lost the war." Whatever he does, it will boil over, either now or later.

[TheWraith]

10. Why would you assume that there could be substance?

There wasn't any substance to the last five shrill, anonymously-sourced articles about Obama allegedly going back on campaign promises.

[Radical Activist]

12. Or not.

Being so quick to assume that Obama is backing away from his promises isn't always the right reaction. We have a new President. We don't have to always assume the worst anymore.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=5019334&mesg_id=5019334

[laconicsax]

3. Hopefully, next month we get to hear about the 28, 34, and 41-month options.

Once you hit 3 and a half years, you might as well drag it out to four. Four's close enough to five, which is a nice round number and won't interfere with the 2012 election.

The only problem with a five-year plan is that 2013 would be around the 10-year anniversary of the war and it's probably important to let the troops celebrate the 10-year point in Iraq with a symbolic march to Baghdad.

Once the war's gone on for 10 years, there isn't much harm in waiting another year--except planning on a complete withdrawal by 2014 could cause some political problems for the midterm elections, and since the 2016 presidential campaigns will start around then anyway, maybe it's best to just leave it to the winner of the 2016 election. By that point, 13 years of occupation will mean that most people won't remember anything else and it might just make the most sense to stay indefinitely.

[Still Sensible]

4. I don't know, I'm kinda glad we've got an

administration looking at an issue in-depth to figure out the best way to proceed... instead of just going hell bent down some ideological path as we have had for eight years. President Obama said over and over again during the campaign that we are going to get out of Iraq and that we would be "as careful getting out as we were careless going in." Sounds to me like that is exactly what is going on.

[Bluebear]

7. I'm glad you approve. Personally, I have friends there that I would love to see come home pronto.

[ThomWV]

5. President Obama needs to fire a few Generals - They don't want to leave.

You can absolutly bet that of the options the Generals gave him they will find major pitfalls with the shorter duration versions and less to complain about with the longer time frames. He neeeds to tell them to get him a fucking plan for the number of months he wants and if they can't hand him that plan to hand him their fucking resignations.

[Radical Activist]

9. damn right.

[kenny blankenship]

6. We can't pull out now! The Pentagon says something bad may happen right before midterm elections!

Well that's that. They're stuck. The Pentagon says it'll take 23 months to get the Army out of Iraq without risk, and there'll always be an election coming up in 24 months. They'd like to help us out and they feel real bad about the whole thing, but Hey, logistics are logistics and fuggedaboutit, you know?

Sorry guys, we tried - but you'll just have to find your own way home. My advice is fight your way north to the border with Turkey. You can sell a bunch of your weapons to the PKK once you get to Mosul which should finance the rest of your journey. From Turkey you'll be able to drift into Europe, and maybe you can sell your services to mercenary companies or the Foreign Legion.

Good Luck.

[Radical Activist]

8. Translation: AFP is shilling for war hawks in the DoD.

This article is a little too obvious. Their source is most likely someone trying to influence Obama to change his policy and this article is part of that effort.

[Bluebear]

11. I hope he's smarter than that :)