Abizaid: Iraq at center of regional issues
Iraq-USA, Politics, 11/18/2006

The top US commander in the Middle East General John Abizaid indicated yesterday while speaking at Harvard university JFK School Of Government that the situation in Iraq is difficult, and the implication was clear that the US is facing major challenges in its efforts in Iraq.

Seen on C-Span, he indicated that Iran has become a major issue to the regional states.

Earlier this weak, he testified to Congress that there is the possibility of the need to increase the US troop levels in order to intensify the training and capability of the Iraqi army, so that they can become more capable, and assume the task of fighting the insurgents more capabably.

Incoming Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin has called for a phased redeployment of U.S. troops over the next four months to six months. In a November 13 press conference, Levin said this would "make it clear to the Iraqis that our presence is not open-ended and that they must take and make the necessary political compromises to preserve Iraq as a nation. We cannot save the Iraqis from themselves."

In his Senate testimony, Abizaid resisted the call for an immediate troop withdrawal, saying it likely would increase sectarian violence. He added that any cap on US troop numbers or timetables for withdrawal would limit US military flexibility in addressing current challenges there. At the same time, however, he advocated relying more heavily on US transitional military advisers embedded with Iraqi forces.

"I believe that the troop levels need to stay where they are. We need to put more American capacity into Iraqi units to make them more capable in their ability to confront the sectarian problem," Abizaid had said.

"Iraqi forces can take more control faster, provided we invest more manpower and resources into the coalition military transition teams, speed the delivery of logistics and mobility enablers, and embrace an aggressive Iraqi-led effort to disarm illegal militias," Abizaid said.

Reflecting the current US and Iraqi government positions, he also rejected Republican Senator John McCain's call to increase the US troop presence in Iraq, saying, "It's easy for the Iraqis to rely upon us to do this work. I believe that more American forces prevent the Iraqis...from taking more responsibility for their own future."

Yesterday, he indicated that the US had initially not invest properly in the needed requirements for a strong Iraq army.

Yesterday, President George W. Bush acknowledged the difficulty of the mission in Iraq but insisted, “We’ll succeed unless we quit.”
The (Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al- Maliki "government is going to make it unless the coalition leaves before they have a chance to make it,” Bush said during a news conference today in Vietnam, where he shared the podium with Australian Prime Minister John Howard. “And that's why I assured the prime minister we'll get the job done.”

People tend to want instant success in the world, but the task in Iraq and elsewhere in the world countering radical extremism “is going to take awhile,” the president, in Vietnam for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, told reporters.

Bush called the war in Iraq just one part of the struggle between radicals and extremists and people who want to live in peace. “And it's just going to take a long period of time … for the … ideology of freedom to overcome an ideology of hate,” he said. “Yet, the world that we live in today is one where (people) want things to happen immediately.”

He emphasized the difficulty of the mission in Iraq and the importance of the coalition standing strong as Iraq’s government progresses. “It’s hard work in Iraq,” the president said. “That's why I'm so proud to have a partner like John Howard who understands it's difficult to get the job done.”

Bush said he assured Howard that a change in the U.S. Congress doesn’t signal a change in the country’s commitment to the Iraq mission. “I … assured him that we're not leaving until this job is done, until Iraq can govern, sustain and defend itself,” he said.

Howard echoed Bush’s sentiments about the need to remain in Iraq until the job is done. “The idea of the coalition leaving in circumstances where the Iraqi people were not soon to be able to look after themselves and to enjoy the democracy they want would be a catastrophic defeat for our cause,” he said. That defeat would extend beyond the Middle East and “would embolden terrorists in that region and it would embolden terrorism in countries like Indonesia,” he said.

Abizaid, yesterday said that Iraq has become a critical to the region in that it has become an intersection of several political issues and regional location, be it the issue of Palestine, extremism or its central location, and the implications these issues have.

Previous Stories:
  White House responds to democratic phased Iraq withdrawal idea   (11/13/2006)
  Rice on Iraq's importance to Mideast transformation   (11/7/2006)
  Iran: US, UK should leave Iraq, region   (11/7/2006)

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