Chinese School - Pentagon: Iraq insurgency steady until '07

WORLD / Middle East

Pentagon: Iraq insurgency steady until '07
(AP)
Updated: 2006-05-31 08:34

The Sunni Arab heart of the Iraqi insurgency seems likely to hold its
strength the rest of the year, and some of its leaders are now
collaborating with al-Qaida terrorists, the Pentagon said Tuesday.

President Bush, right, shakes hands as he participates in a Credentials
Ceremony for the Ambassador of Iraq to the United States, Samir
Sumaidaie, left, in the Oval Office of the White House, Tuesday, May 30,
2006 in Washington. [AP]

In a report assessing the situation in Iraq, required quarterly by
Congress, the Pentagon painted a mixed picture on a day when the U.S.
military command in Baghdad said 1,500 more combat troops have arrived in
the country. The extra troops are part of an intensified effort to wrest
control of the provincial capital of Ramadi from insurgents.

The report to Congress offered a relatively dim picture of economic
progress, with few gains in improving basic services like electricity,
and it provided no promises of U.S. troop reductions anytime soon.

On the other hand, it said the Iraqi army is gaining strength and taking
lead responsibility for security in more areas.

The U.S. government has struggled for three years to understand the
shadowy insurgency in Iraq, which began in the Sunni Triangle west and
north of Baghdad. In Tuesday's report, the Pentagon said the
"rejectionists" who are a key element of the insurgency are holding their
own against U.S. and Iraqi forces.

"MNF-I expects that rejectionist strength will likely remain steady
throughout 2006, but that their appeal and motivation for continued
violent action will begin to wane in early 2007," the report said. The
term MNF-I refers to the Multinational Force-Iraq, the top American
military command in Baghdad.

It also said for the first time that the Sunnis who reject the U.S.-based
government are collaborating with al-Qaida.

"Some hardline Sunni rejectionists have joined al-Qaida in Iraq in recent
months, increasing the terrorists' attack options," the report said.

It said a separate element of the insurgency that U.S. officials describe
as former loyalists of the Saddam Hussein regime remains an important
enabler of the violence in Iraq. But the Saddam loyalists have "mostly
splintered" into other groups. As a result, they are now "largely
irrelevant" as a threat to the fledgling Iraqi government, said Lt. Gen.
Victor E. Renuart, the head of strategic plans and policy for the Joint
Chiefs of Staff, who helped prepare the report.

The report also said that while security in much of Iraq has improved,
total attacks against U.S. and Iraqi forces have increased in recent
months, following the Feb. 22 bombing of the Golden Mosque in Samarra.

President Bush said he remained hopeful that the new Iraqi government
will succeed in stabilizing the country.

"Although there's been some very difficult times for the Iraqi people,
I'm impressed by the courage of the leadership, impressed by the
determination of the people," Bush said Tuesday in the Oval Office during
the credentialing ceremony for Samir Sumaidaie, Iraq's ambassador to the
United States.

The troop move announced Tuesday involves about 1,500 soldiers from an
armored brigade on standby in Kuwait and reflects a deteriorating
security situation in the volatile provincial capital of Ramadi. It
raises the number of U.S. military brigades in Iraq from 15 to 16, just
five months after the number was cut from 17 to 15. A brigade has at
least 3,500 troops.

The administration is under election-year pressure to demonstrate
concrete progress in Iraq and to begin reducing U.S. troop levels at a
time when the Army and Marines in particular are stretched thin by war
deployments.

Anthony Cordesman, an Iraq watcher with the Center for Strategic and
International Studies, said Tuesday there is no clear basis for believing
U.S. troop levels can be reduced anytime soon without risking further
deterioration in the security situation. He said the best measure of
progress is not the number of U.S. troops in Iraq but the degree to which
their role in counterinsurgency operations is assumed by Iraqis.

"I think, in honesty, that now looks a lot more like 2007 at the earliest
(for) really having serious reductions in the U.S. combat role (and)
being certain that the U.S. casualty levels are going down on a lasting
basis and being able to reduce the costs of the war," Cordesman said in a
telephone interview.

Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said there are 130,000 U.S. troops in
Iraq. It was not clear whether that included the 1,500 soldiers from two
battalions of the 2nd brigade of the 1st Armored Division whose
deployment to the Ramadi area was described as "short term" in a U.S.
military statement from Baghdad.

A defense official said the two battalions were expected to be in Anbar
for a maximum of four months, operating as part of a Marine force. The
official was not authorized to discuss such details and so spoke on
condition of anonymity.

A third battalion from the brigade in Kuwait was sent to Baghdad in March
as part of a broader plan to improve security in the capital during the
formation of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's new cabinet. That cabinet
was announced and put in place more than a week ago but still lacks
ministers of defense and interior, who control the Iraqi army and police.
Whitman said that battalion is still operating in the Baghdad area.

Most Commented/Read Stories in 48 Hours

Today's Top News 

� US$900m loans to SCO members for China exports

� China emerging from shadows of AIDS

� Court hears last appeal for fugitive Lai

� Foot-and-mouth in Hubei, Gansu

� Yangtze river 'cancerous' with pollution

Top World News 

� U.S. moving 1,500 troops to Iraq

� Troops keep watch over Afghan capital

� Iran wants to resume EU talks

� CBS correspondent critical but stable

� Saddam trial resumes, defense case to continue

Alibaba is the largest B2B marketplace in the world. Source model ship,
wooden puzzle, one-piece toilet, RC hovercraft, photo album, prom dress,
pocket bike, Vaginal Speculum, Samurai Sword, String Panty and PVC Pipe.

Learn Chinese, Free Chinese Lesson, Learning Materials, Mandarin audio lessons, Chinese writing lessons, Chinese vocabulary lists, About chinese characters, News in Chinese, Go to China, Travel to China, Study in China, Teach in China, Dictionaries, Learn Chinese Painting, Your name in Chinese, Chinese calligraphy, Chinese songs, Chinese proverbs, Chinese poetry, Chinese tattoo, Beijing 2008 Olympics, Mandarin Phrasebook, Chinese editor, Pinyin editor, China Travel, Travel to Beijing, Travel to Tibet