Army Chief May Shorten Tours In Iraq, Afghanistan by Summer

January 17, 2008
Army Chief May Shorten Tours In Iraq, Afghanistan by Summer

Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the Army's chief of staff, said yesterday he hopes to shorten the 15-month tours in Iraq and Afghanistan this summer. The move would end a policy, required by the buildup of nearly 30,000 U.S. troops in Iraq last year, that has placed significant stress on soldiers and their families.

Casey suggested that the withdrawal from Iraq of five U.S. Army combat brigades by July could allow soldiers once again to deploy for 12 months and then spend a year at home, although he cautioned that a decision will depend on conditions in Iraq.

Media Misrepresent Dems' Options on Iraq War: Confusing 'can't' and 'won't'

September 13, 2007
Media Misrepresent Dems' Options on Iraq War: Confusing 'can't' and 'won't'

The problem with all these accounts is that Congress does not have to pass legislation to bring an end to the war in Iraq--it simply has to block passage of any bill that would continue to fund the war. This requires not 67 or 60 Senate votes, or even 51, but just 41--the number of senators needed to maintain a filibuster and prevent a bill from coming up for a vote. In other words, the Democrats have more than enough votes to end the Iraq War--if they choose to do so.

The Democratic leadership may believe--rightly or wrongly--that such a strategy would entail unacceptable political costs. But that's very different from being unable to affect policy. To insist, as many media outlets have, that the Constitution makes it impossible for Congress to stop the war obscures the actual choices facing the nation--by confusing "can't" with "won't."

US military drafts plan to keep troops in Iraq until mid-2009

July 24, 2007
US military drafts plan to keep troops in Iraq until mid-2009

WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States military command in Iraq has drafted a plan that envisages US troops staying in the country for another two years, the New York Times reported Tuesday.

The strategy document calls for restoring security in Baghdad and other local areas by the summer of 2008 and for "sustainable security" to be achieved across Iraq by the summer of 2009, the newspaper wrote, citing unnamed US officials.

Conservatives call for Bush to emphasize 'leaving Iraq'

July 25, 2007
Conservatives call for Bush to emphasize 'leaving Iraq'

By talking openly about the war's conclusion, Republicans could blunt criticism about supporting an open-ended conflict in Iraq while continuing to attack Democrats for "surrendering" by supporting a specific date for withdrawing troops from Iraq, the activists contend. Pointing to an end to the war will also help reshape the debate about what happens to Iraq after the U.S. leaves, an area that conservatives feel has been overshadowed by Capitol Hill's continued focus on whether to withdraw troops from the region.

General slams GOP senators on Iraq policy

July 18, 2007
General slams GOP senators on Iraq policy

Retired Maj. Gen. John Batiste, former division commanding general in Iraq, said he was "disappointed" in the way most Republican senators voted to oppose the Democrat-backed legislation that passed the U.S. House of Representatives last week. President George W. Bush is expected to veto the measure.

"Our incredible all-volunteer force cannot sustain the current pace and America desperately needs a focused Middle East strategy," Batiste said. "Conservatives never have stood for using our military for nation building or refereeing civil wars, and unfortunately politicians like many Republicans in the Senate are getting away from that. Their vote was inconsistent with a true, conservative, pro-military policy."

Batiste has angered Republican legislators in the U.S. Congress with his testimony in a highly charged congressional hearing on developments in the war.

Minneapolis Tribune: "end the war"

July 15, 2007
Minneapolis Tribune: "end the war"

President Bush, having dispatched top officials to Capitol Hill to shore up support on Iraq, saw defections occurring instead and ended up in a high-stakes power showdown on Thursday. After lecturing Congress on its role (consultation, by his lights), he emphasized his power as chief decider. But it's way past time for all that. Members of Congress must counter his stance with a strong new, and newly bipartisan, effort to responsibly end this war.

Perhaps strangest -- if he truly believes what he said -- were the president's repetitive attempts Thursday to portray the struggle in Iraq as principally a fight against Al-Qaida. This is getting old, and it suggests acute persuasion desperation. We all know that Al-Qaida in Mesopotamia is one of the extremist elements in Iraq, that it is responsible for a high percentage of suicide attacks there. But it is neither the principal problem in Iraq nor connected to the 9/11 attacks in 2001, as he continues to imply. In fact, it didn't exist then, and has enlisted support largely because of the U.S. occupation.

Since Bush is having his logic all ways and clearly is in denial about the state of affairs in Iraq, senior members of Congress -- despite Bush's implication that they are overstepping their authority -- must get beyond their party interests and/or 2008 campaign maneuvering and craft a firm, joint message to Bush.

The Iraq Debate That Wasn't

July 13, 2007
The Iraq Debate That Wasn't

One way or another, something along the lines the President is describing will likely occur in 2008, if not sooner. And then, regardless of the situation on the ground, Bush will say he moved the right number of troops at the right time. The Democrats will say they forced him to do so, and will find new ways to keep the mess in Iraq front and center in the national debate - without necessarily pushing to bring all the troops home right away. If you're looking for someone who will lead a speedy withdrawal from Iraq, you'll have to go to the extreme left or right of the parties. Nobody in the mainstream is looking to get out soon.

Democrats to revive Iraq war timetables

June 12, 2007
Democrats to revive Iraq war timetables

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Senate Democrats will once again try to impose timetables for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, Majority Leader Harry Reid announced Tuesday.

Reid said Democrats will use a defense authorization bill for fiscal year 2008 as a vehicle to revive two Iraq timetable amendments that they pushed unsuccessfully during a fight over Iraq funding in May.

Democrats Bungle War Talking Points

June 4, 2007
Democrats Bungle War Talking Points

Goffstown, N.H -- Ever since Senate Majority leader Harry Reid provoked a firestorm last April by declaring "the war is lost" -- without attributing defeat to President Bush -- Democrats have scrambled to pin the Iraq fiasco on the Republican Party.

Leading Democratic presidential candidates have had trouble, however, keeping the strategically critical issue of blame in focus. In the debate Sunday night at St. Anselm College here, neither Barack Obama nor John Edwards directly targeted Bush on his culpability for the war.

Democrats plan a Capitol assault over Iraq

June 4, 2007
Democrats plan a Capitol assault over Iraq

"The debate on Iraq will continue," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) said last week. Pelosi, who in March helped push Democrats to embrace a withdrawal of American combat forces, has pledged that the House will vote on numerous measures aimed at ending the war.

Tom Matzzie, campaign manager for Americans Against Escalation in Iraq, the leading coalition against the war, promised an equally unpleasant summer for Republicans whenever they return home.

Democrats to fund Iraq war with no pullout date

May 22, 2007
Democrats to fund Iraq war with no pullout date

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President George W. Bush won a battle over nearly
$100 billion to fund the Iraq war as Democratic leaders in Congress on Tuesday
abandoned efforts to withdraw troops for now but pledged to try again in
July.

Instead of setting schedules for pulling U.S. troops, it appeared the
Democratic-run Congress and the Republican White House agreed for the first
time to include conditions prodding Baghdad to make better progress toward
quelling violence or risk losing around $1.3 billion in U.S. reconstruction
aid.

Only Republicans Can Stop the War

May 18, 2007
Only Republicans Can Stop the War

On May 9 of this year, that scene was repeated, more or less, in the White House of George W. Bush. It was all Republicans this time, a dozen moderate Republicans came to call and warn the emperor.

It was self-defense. They are the ones most worried that they will go down in next year's election as the Iraq war sinks into deeper disaster. One of the congressman, Tom Davis, told Bush that the president's approval rating was about 5 percent in his northern Virginia district.

Iraq MPs gather votes to force US withdrawal

May 12, 2007
Iraq MPs gather votes to force US withdrawal

Iraqi MPs are gathering votes to force their government to set a deadline for US forces to withdraw from the country and think they have a majority, a leading Shiite politician said on Friday.

Baha al-Aaraji, a supporter of radical anti-American cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, told AFP that 144 members of the 275-seat national assembly had signed a draft law that would set a departure timetable for US troops.

However, other legislators said the bill would probably be watered down before becoming a non-binding petition, and that Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki would martial enough support to renew the US mandate next month.

11 House Republicans Meet with Bush - war is harming the GOP

May 10, 2007
11 House Republicans Meet with Bush - war is harming the GOP

WASHINGTON - House Republican moderates, in a remarkably blunt White House meeting, warned President Bush this week that his pursuit of the war in Iraq is risking the future of the Republican Party and that he cannot count on GOP support for many more months.

The meeting, which ran for an hour and a half Tuesday afternoon, was disclosed by participants yesterday as the House prepared to vote this evening on a spending bill that could cut funding for the Iraq war as early as July. GOP moderates told Bush they would stay united against the latest effort by House Democrats to end U.S. involvement in the war. Even Senate Democrats called the House measure unrealistic.

But the meeting between 11 House Republicans, Bush, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, White House political adviser Karl Rove and presidential press secretary Tony Snow was perhaps the clearest sign yet that patience in the party is running out. The meeting, organized by Rep. Charlie Dent (Pa.), one of the co-chairs of the moderate "Tuesday Group," included Reps. Thomas M. Davis III (Va.), Michael N. Castle (Del.), Todd R. Platts (Pa.), Jim Ramstad (Minn.) and Jo Ann Emerson (Mo.).

Snow, who sat in on the meeting in the president's private quarters, said it should not be overdramatized or seen as another "marching up to Nixon," a reference to the critical moment during Watergate in 1974 when key congressional Republicans went to the White House to tell President Richard M. Nixon that it was time to resign.

Poll: Most back Congress over Bush in war funding

May 8, 2007
Poll: Most back Congress over Bush in war funding

Former Sen. John Edwards said Congress shouldn't back down. "If we don't have the votes to override the veto, the Congress should send him another bill with the funding authority for the troops, with a timetable for withdrawal," the Democratic presidential candidate said.

The public agrees. In the new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll released Tuesday, 57 percent want Congress to pass another bill with funding and timetables.

The poll surveyed 1,028 American adults between Friday and Sunday. It has a sampling error of 3 percentage points.

UK Genenal: Iraq War is Hopeless

May 3, 2007
UK Genenal: Iraq War is Hopeless

Gen Sir Michael Rose also told the BBC's Newsnight programme that the US and the UK must "admit defeat" and stop fighting "a hopeless war" in Iraq.

He told Newsnight: "As Lord Chatham said, when he was speaking on the British presence in North America, he said 'if I was an American, as I am an Englishman, as long as one Englishman remained on American native soil, I would never, never, never lay down my arms'.

"The Iraqi insurgents feel exactly the same way."

He said it was time to bring troops home.

Gen. Batiste: Withdraw from civil war

April 12, 2007
Gen. Batiste: Withdraw from civil war

"We still are playing a game of whack-a-mole," Batiste said. "It's the Myth of Sisyphus playing out over and over again… This country isn't mobilized. We don't have our heart into this… and the strategy is no more unified today than it was in March of 2003… It's time for this great country to accept the cold hard facts that we are right in the middle of an Iraqi civil war, and it is an absolute mess."

"Yes, I favor a draw-down," one of the administration's former "generals on the ground" said about congressional calls for a withdrawal of forces from Iraq… "We've got to pace ourselves and stop the Bush administration from driving us to a global culminating point.

"What we have is a failure in leadership," Batiste said today, as he had one year ago.

Iraqis welcome U.S. Congress vote

April 27, 2007
Iraqis welcome U.S. Congress vote

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqis are glad U.S. soldiers could soon depart but fearful of what they might leave behind, after the U.S. Congress approved a bill linking troop withdrawals to war funding.

"U.S. forces have to leave Iraq but not now," said Abu Ali, a 47-year-old trader from the southern city of Basra, on Friday.

"The Iraqi government and its security forces are unable to control security, especially in Baghdad and its neighborhoods."

Like many, he said tying funding to a timetable to withdraw U.S. troops over the next 11 months would force Iraq's police and army units to shape up quicker.

Senate passes Iraq withdrawal bill; veto threat looms

April 26, 2007
Senate passes Iraq withdrawal bill; veto threat looms

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush is warming up his veto muscles after the Senate passed a war funding bill Thursday that sets a deadline for withdrawal of U.S. combat forces from Iraq by next April.

The 51 votes cast for the bill are nowhere near the 67 needed to override a veto, which Bush says he will deliver swiftly. The House passed the same measure on a 218-208 vote Wednesday night.

But Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said demanding a withdrawal while U.S. commanders are claiming progress in pacifying the Iraqi capital would hand a victory to the al Qaeda terrorist network, which has taken root in Iraq.

Analysis: Veto Won't End Iraq Dispute

April 24, 2007
Analysis: Veto Won't End Iraq Dispute

In the political test of wills over Iraq, congressional Democrats opposed to the war have public opinion on their side and President Bush has enough Republican votes to make his vetoes stick. Long term, that's not a winning formula for the White House.

"This war must end," Sen. Joseph Biden said Tuesday, one day after Democrats decided to send Bush legislation that funds the conflict but sets a one-year timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. troops.

Conceding Bush's current strength among Republicans, the Delaware Democrat said he looked forward to the day when enough GOP senators could be persuaded to "stop backing the president and start backing the troops."