U.S. Presence In Iraq Likely To Be Reduced Further

October 16, 2011

All attempts to press Iraq into keeping U.S. troops in Iraq failed. The U.S. is giving up:

The U.S. is abandoning plans to keep U.S. troops in Iraq past a year-end withdrawal deadline, The Associated Press has learned.
…
A Pentagon spokesman said Saturday that no final decision has been reached about the U.S. training relationship with the Iraqi government.

But a senior Obama administration official in Washington confirmed Saturday that all American troops will leave Iraq except for about 160 active-duty soldiers attached to the U.S. Embassy.

A senior U.S. military official confirmed the departure and said the withdrawal could allow future but limited U.S. military training missions in Iraq if requested.

The U.S. still plans to keep a division sized embassy with a brigade of contractor guards.

The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad is the largest in the world, and the State Department will have offices in Basra, Irbil and Kirkuk as well as other locations around the country where contractors will train Iraqi forces on U.S. military equipment they're purchasing.

About 5,000 security contractors and personnel will be tasked with helping protect American diplomats and facilities around the country, the State Department has said.

But that embassy is a fixed target which can easily be harassed with by rocket and mortar fire. Its logistic lines of communication are also open to permanent challenges. The mercenaries guarding it will have severely restricted rules of engagement and will not be able to prevent attacks.

Aside from those problems I find it dubious to believe that Iraqi politicians and government functionaries are willing to talk to all those diplomats. Why should they?

In the end most of the diplomats will sit in their offices with nothing to do but to be ready to jump up and head to the bunkers when the next rocket alarm goes off. Additonally there is pressure from Congress to reduce the State Department's budget.

This all will soon lead a reduction of the now planned immense U.S. diplomatic presence in Iraq. A year from now that presence may very well come down to more normal levels of just a few hundred people.

Posted by b on October 16, 2011 at 08:27 UTC | Permalink

Comments

YES!
I assume the contractors will also NOT have immunity, so the cowboys will be so severely curtailed they won’t last long as well.
Looks like Mookie finally won the war, as I’ve (so reservedly) predicted for years now.

Posted by: anna missed | Oct 16 2011 9:23 utc | 1

I second Anna Missed on this! This is a sliver of good news.
Looks like Obama can campaign on keeping one of his promises, even though he didn’t want to!

Posted by: Maxcrat | Oct 16 2011 12:28 utc | 2

Then there’s this:
Source: Reuters
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Obama administration denied a news report on Saturday it had made a final decision to pull almost all U.S. troops out of Iraq by a year-end withdrawal deadline.
The White House and Pentagon both denied an Associated Press report citing unnamed U.S. officials saying they completely dropped the idea of possibly keeping a significant contingent in Iraq as trainers for Iraqi security forces beyond 2011.

Posted by: ben | Oct 16 2011 13:19 utc | 3

in view of the possibility that Uganda has more oil than Iraq, perhaps changing our focus is being contemplated… and we don’t have all the resources in the world, eh!

Posted by: lambent1 | Oct 16 2011 13:40 utc | 4

a rather elderly like to Uganda oil – and my apologies if its not the many billions of barrels the first enthusiasms suggested!
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article29410.htm

Posted by: lambent1 | Oct 16 2011 13:54 utc | 5

This news will only be confirmed after the elections are over and Obama is back in power. If he loses, then the next guy will negotiate again for another 4 years.

Posted by: shanks | Oct 16 2011 14:37 utc | 6

Shanks is the closest. Iraq will not be turned over in its truest sense, even if it looks like that on the surface. Of course, they could let it build up a little bit only to tear it back down again…..kind of like a seasonal harvest fetilized with depleted uranium and irrigated with blood.

Posted by: Morocco Bama | Oct 16 2011 16:47 utc | 7

Here’s a story which helps explain how the post-withdrawal security ‘gaps’ in EyeRack will be filled, or compensated for.
http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175454/tomgram%3A_nick_turse%2C_mapping_america%27s_shadowy_drone_wars/
It says there are currently approximately 60 operational US drone bases worldwide and plans are afoot to increase that number significantly.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Oct 17 2011 2:16 utc | 8

Off topic, and just a thought.
The drone story raises the prospect that China and Russia might be tempted to destroy ALL of America’s GPS and communications satellites if the Yankees get too big for their boots. Several years ago, China was criticised for destroying one of its own satellites. It was such a stupid (in orbiting debris-creation terms) thing to do that it could only be interpreted as a warning.
Imo, this possibility is directly related to US proliferation of so-called Anti-(ballistic) missile installations. ABMs are, imo, a waste of time and money because of pursuit, navigation and targeting problems, complicated immensely by the vectors involved.
However, such a system would be better suited to shooting down a missile aimed at a satellite because the precise destination of the target could be anticipated without the need for precise 3D tracking.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Oct 17 2011 3:00 utc | 9

Hoarsewhisperer, I know nothing of this topic, but couldn’t some of these sattelites that are geosynchronous above, say china or Russia be indefensible simply due to there proximity? Also, if the orbit is known, couldn’t an opponent simply place debris in the path? It seems to me that drones will be strategically much like aircraft carriers; a useful intimidation against a 3rd world country that can’t fight back but irrelevant and vulnerable in a naval war against an advanced enemy.

Posted by: Lysander | Oct 17 2011 4:01 utc | 10

If true, or even “substantially true”, U.S. withdrawal from Iraq is good news. The next logical step would be to start work on reparations payments and serious investigation leading to prosecutions for the war crimes committed by “the liberators”, but no one visiting this site will expect logic, due process, or justice to prevail.

Posted by: Hannah K. O’Luthon | Oct 17 2011 7:46 utc | 11

Lysander, geosychronous altitude is circa 30,000 km so proximity isn’t a problem. It’s not necessary to nuke a satellite to disable it; a good hard whack or shrapnel will do the trick. Placing ‘debris in its path’ is impractical and more problematic than simply sending a missile up to intercept and disable it (objects in the same orbit won’t collide in any meaningful way). Placing debris in an intersecting orbit would be more complex and risky (likely to miss) than intercepting it directly.
I agree that, in October 2011, drones are more of a 3rd world nuisance than a global threat. But the Yankees have an unfortunate habit of ‘mission-creeping’ everything until it bites them on the ass.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Oct 17 2011 13:08 utc | 12

Maybe I’m just a broken record where Iraq is concerned, but, I still believe the West will never totally leave Iraq. Has anyone determined the amount of contractors left there? Who controls the vast oil reserves there? Despite the reductions in troop levels, I think the West still controls the vast bulk of the Iraqi government policies through their lackeys, put in place after hostilities ended. Which I believe, was the end game all along. As always, time will tell.

Posted by: ben | Oct 17 2011 13:41 utc | 13

Hannah @ 11.
Bush II and Obama made those notions redundant.
Obama Himself has declared extra-judicial murder to be not just OK for America’s interests, but de regeur.
Personally, I can hardly wait to see who gets ‘justiced’ first.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Oct 17 2011 14:03 utc | 14

geosychronous altitude is circa 30,000 km so proximity isn’t a problem.
GPS satellites are not geosynchronous, though communication satellites are.

Posted by: alexno | Oct 18 2011 9:59 utc | 15

On the legal situation in Iraq.
As far as I know, Iraq has agreed/will agree to 5000 “trainers”, but by cabinet decision has refused immunity from prosecution for potential crimes.
As for security contractors, I think a law was passed insisting that they be Iraqi, and again they will be subject to Iraqi law.
All of which is quite terminally negative for the US in Iraq. It is nearly impossible for the parliament, or the government, to change its public political stance. One can only do what can be done without parliamentary approval, and if revealed, will not cause a public political storm. That is not much.

Posted by: alexno | Oct 18 2011 10:10 utc | 16

These wars (Iraq, Afgh.) serve no understandable purpose in traditional terms. For example, to exploit and benefit from the natural resources, such as oil or minerals or even agriculture – US diplomacy, “Aid”, and so called win-win deals implemented with some arm twisting and corruption would have accomplished more with less damage to, and outlay by, the USA. As for the whole ‘democracy and modernity’ spiel, which nobody believes in anyway, gains in that area cannot be accomplished by war, as is obvious.
The wars purposes are twofold: 1) To keep feeding and funding the defense, security industry, keep citizens ‘paying’ to some section of the ‘economy’; and 2) maintain US hegemony through threats that are demonstrated as being real. The US can destroy a country if it decides to do so – and that keeps everyone in line, be it at the UN, the OECD, the IMF, countries hostile to Israel, China, and so on, a long list.
So these occupations don’t arise, peter out, or stop in function of any discernible aims on the ground. They are just an opportunity for funds transfers, investments, shady deals, and USA Mission Accomplished Hubris.
They also serve to keep a section of US citizens afraid, patriotic, and subservient to some illusory ideology which stipulates that aggression and so called Defense, the killing of a lot of brown ppl very far away, is necessary to keep the American Dream and the Beacon on the Hill going. At present, an increasing number of ppl are questioning that, but they don’t realize how much they benefit from it….
I very much doubt the occupation of Iraq will actually be wound down, finish, there are too many ppl making gobs of money out of it.

Posted by: Noirette | Oct 18 2011 14:08 utc | 17

alexno @ 15.
Wiki has an excellent article on GPS including an animated diagram of the system.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Positioning_System

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Oct 18 2011 15:23 utc | 18

I very much doubt the occupation of Iraq will actually be wound down, finish, there are too many ppl making gobs of money out of it.
Chère Noirette,
I’ve had this kind of argument since 26th June 2008, the day when Bush declared his colonial conditions of the SOFA, with perpetual occupation. The US lost the war in November 2008, when Bush signed to the Iraqi conditions. He had no choice.
It was a brilliant move on the part of al-Maliki. The US lost, and is obliged to move out by 31 December 2011, unless a change is agreed by the Iraqi parliament. That will never happen, for political reasons.
I only wish al-Maliki had been so determined in his policies since then. But the one act decided the war.
For whatever reason, the US cannot break an international treaty.
A trillion dollars have been lost. but no matter. A US congressman went to Baghdad this summer, and demanded of al-Maliki that Iraq refund the US the costs of its invasion. He was ushered out of the country. That was the final straw. No way that Iraq would bend to US demands after that.
Looking back in retrospect, it was the only way for Iraq to win. Military victory was impossible in such a flat desert country (as opposed to Afghanistan). The only potential victory was political, and it worked. Let the Americans think they won, and then get them out of the country. 31 december, here we come.
It’s only a pity that the Iraqis are still disunited. But that may be an illusion.
There’s an atmosphere of optimism. My French colleague wants to go to Baghdad in the spring. The Spanish mission lands on the 20th October (we’re talking of archaeologists, of which I am one). I am going to Erbil in two weeks, with a plan to revive work in Arab Iraq. We’ll see what happens.
I’ll tell you what happened, when I get back.

Posted by: alexno | Oct 18 2011 21:28 utc | 19

I have real doubts about the “US cannot break an international treaty” in light of the fact that they trashed the Geneva Conventions and Nuremberg Principles to hell and back.

Posted by: Susan | Oct 19 2011 0:10 utc | 20

I have real doubts about the “US cannot break an international treaty” in light of the fact that they trashed the Geneva Conventions and Nuremberg Principles to hell and back.
Yeah, that’s the standard response on MoA.
But it would put the wind up all sorts of US allies, who rely on treaties with the US. What you do to brown people, you can get away with. With major powers, you have to be more careful. Basic practicality.
No, the US is finished in Iraq. They can’t turn round now. That’s why they’re keeping so quiet. They’re hoping people won’t notice what’s happening.

Posted by: alexno | Oct 19 2011 7:40 utc | 21

@alexno comment 19

I’ll tell you what happened, when I get back.

Yes please !
@alexno comment 21
I’ve no doubt that the US happily breaks international treaties. With their ‘better’ allies (aka, the West), they’ll just strong-arm them behind the curtain into accepting modifications. But I agree with you that the US is basically finished in Irak. They’ll keep a foot in the door, but they won’t have more influence than, say, the countries neighbouring Irak (compare and contrast to the situation in Japan, even after 60+ years). The MSM has yet to discover it fully (and won’t make much noise about it).

Posted by: philippe | Oct 19 2011 8:49 utc | 22

Voilà! Now Obama has announced the complete withdrawal of US forces by 31 December. The argument being that immunity is refused.
Nobody can be surprised. I said it from June 26 2008 onwards, and repeated it endlessly. The US lost, and Iraq won. It was a political victory, because a military victory was impossible. Maliki engineered it well.
It may be that Maliki now regrets what he did. Politics in Iraq is complicated. He certainly softened later. But the act was done with the signature of the SOFA in November 2008.
Public politics in Iraq, that is public opinion, does not allow Maliki to compromise. Note that Talebani, the Kurdish President of Iraq, has had no influence, though the Kurds would like the US to stay.
Public opinion in Iraq seems to have remained solid against the US. I should think that has something to do with the brutalities and horrors that the US inflicted without hesitating.
A trillion dollars down the drain, 4,400 dead, a country ruined, and nothing achieved. It’s calamitous for the US position in the world.

Posted by: alexno | Oct 21 2011 20:55 utc | 23

Yay ! it is official now. Barack Obama: All US troops to leave Iraq in 2011 (BBC link) [*].
Time to celebrate a little this resounding defeat ! Congrats to the people of Irak.
[*] of course, the media tries to spin it… that the Iraki government actually wanted the US to stay a little, and bla and bla and bla.

Posted by: philippe | Oct 22 2011 2:13 utc | 24

It was way more than 4,400 dead in Iraq.
WAY MORE!!

Posted by: Susan | Oct 22 2011 2:37 utc | 25

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