Army Ready For Iraq Long Haul

August 22, 2005, 4:27 pm
WASHINGTON — The Army is planning for the possibility of keeping the current number of soldiers in Iraq — well over 100,000 — for four more years, the Army's top general said Saturday.

In an Associated Press interview, Gen. Peter Schoomaker (search) said the Army is prepared for the "worst case" in terms of the required level of troops in Iraq. He said the number could be adjusted lower if called for by slowing the force rotation or by shortening tours for soldiers.

Schoomaker said commanders in Iraq and others who are in the chain of command will decide how many troops will be needed next year and beyond. His responsibility is to provide them, trained and equipped.

About 138,000 U.S. troops, including about 25,000 Marines, are now in Iraq.

"We are now into '07-'09 in our planning," Schoomaker said, having completed work on the set of combat and support units that will be rotated into Iraq over the coming year for 12-month tours of duty.

Schoomaker's comments come amid indications from Bush administration officials and commanders in Iraq that the size of the U.S. force may be scaled back next year if certain conditions are achieved.

Among those conditions: an Iraqi constitution must be drafted in coming days; it must be approved in a national referendum; and elections must be held for a new government under that charter.

Schoomaker, who spoke aboard an Army jet on the trip back to Washington from Kansas City, Mo., made no predictions about the pace of political progress in Iraq. But he said he was confident the Army could provide the current number of forces to fight the insurgency for many more years. The 2007-09 rotation he is planning would go beyond President Bush's term in office, which ends in January 2009.

Schoomaker was in Kansas City for a dinner Friday hosted by the Military Order of the World Wars, a veterans' organization.

"We're staying 18 months to two years ahead of ourselves" in planning which active-duty and National Guard and Reserve units will be provided to meet the commanders' needs, Schoomaker said in the interview.

The main active-duty combat units that are scheduled to go to Iraq in the coming year are the 101st Airborne Division (search), based at Fort Campbell, Ky., and the 4th Infantry Division from Fort Hood, Texas. Both did one-year tours earlier in the war.

The Army has changed the way it arranges troop rotations.

Instead of sending a full complement of replacement forces each 12-month cycle, it is stretching out the rotation over two years.

The current rotation, for 2005-07, will overlap with the 2006-08 replacements. Beyond that, the Army is piecing together the plan for the 2007-09 switch, Schoomaker said.

With the recent deployments of National Guard brigades from Georgia and Pennsylvania, the National Guard has seven combat brigades in Iraq — the most of the entire war — plus thousands of support troops.

Along with the Army Reserve and Marine Reserve, they account for about 40 percent of the total U.S. forces in Iraq. Schoomaker said that will be scaled back next year to about 25 percent as newly expanded active-duty divisions such as the 101st Airborne enter the rotation.

August has been the deadliest month of the war for the National Guard and Reserve, with at least 42 fatalities thus far. Schoomaker disputed the suggestion by some that the Guard and Reserve units are not fully prepared for the hostile environment of Iraq.

"I'm very confident that there is no difference in the preparation" of active-duty soldiers and the reservists, who normally train one weekend a month and two weeks each summer, unless they are mobilized. Once called to active duty, they go through the same training as active-duty units.

In internal surveys, some in the reserve forces have indicated to Army leaders that they think they are spending too much time in pre-deployment training, not too little, Schoomaker said.

"Consistently, what we've been (hearing) is, `We're better than you think we are, and we could do this faster,'" he said. "I can promise you that we're not taking any risk in terms of what we're doing to prepare people."



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Yahoo! News: Top Stories
(last updated: Thu, 21 Aug 2008 17:18:44 GMT)		 unfoldmore

US, Iraq have draft to pull US troops out (AP)
[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 16:47:48 GMT]

A U.S. Army soldier from Hammer Company, 3rd Squadron, 2nd Stryker Cavalry Regiment stands guard near two suspected terrorists in Nahr al-Imam, about 90 kilometers (60 miles) north of Baghdad in Iraq's volatile Diyala province on Wednesday, July 30, 2008. Twenty men were detained in the pre-dawn sweep. Nearly 50,000 Iraqi police and soldiers were involved in a U.S.-backed operation against al-Qaida in Iraq in one of its last major strongholds near the capital, a senior provincial official said Wednesday. (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo)AP - Iraq and the U.S. have reached preliminary agreement to withdraw American forces from Iraqi cities by next June, six years into the increasingly unpopular war, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said Thursday after meeting with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.


Suicide bombing at Pakistan arms complex kills 59 (AP)
[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 15:07:54 GMT]

Pakistani lawyers chant slogan during a rally demanding to restore the deposed judges, Thursday, Aug. 21, 2008 in Lahore, Pakistan. A key party in Pakistan's ruling coalition threatened to quit unless judges fired by former President Pervez Musharraf were quickly reinstated — dashing hopes his departure would end the nation's turmoil. (AP Photo/K.M.Chaudary)AP - Twin Taliban suicide bombings at Pakistan's largest weapons complex killed at least 59 people Thursday, heightening the turmoil following Pervez Musharraf's ouster as president.


Tropical Storm Fay forces more evacuations in Fla. (AP)
[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 16:07:03 GMT]

National Guard troops and local law enforcement officers wade through water in the Lamplighter Village neighborhood as they help residents evacuate from the flooding caused by Tropical Storm Fay in Melbourne, Fla., Thursday, Aug. 21, 2008.(AP Photo/John Raoux)AP - Torrential rains from a slow-moving Tropical Storm Fay triggered a new round of flooding Thursday, submerging roads and forcing dozens of people to flee the rising water in their homes.


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[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 15:59:21 GMT]

Japan's Yukiyo Mine, right, and pitcher Yukiko Ueno celebrate after winning the gold medal against the USA in the gold medal softball game in the Beijing 2008 Olympics in Beijing, Thursday, Aug. 21, 2008. (AP Photo/Elaine Thompson)AP - Losing for the first time since 2000, the U.S. softball team was denied a chance for a fourth straight gold medal Thursday, beaten 3-1 by Japan in the sport's last appearance in the Olympics for at least eight years — and maybe for good.


Butterfingers drop US men, women out of 400 relays (AP)
[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 15:22:45 GMT]

Jamaica's Veronica Campbell-Brown, right, and United States' Allyson Felix compete in the women's 200-meter final during the athletics competitions in the National Stadium at the Beijing 2008 Olympics in Beijing, Thursday, Aug. 21, 2008. Campbell-Brown won the gold medal. (AP Photo/Anja Niedringhaus)AP - Tyson Gay reached back to grab the baton "and there was nothing." He's not the only American track favorite who will leave Beijing empty-handed. The American men's and women's 400-meter relay teams both misconnected on the final handoffs in their preliminaries Thursday, a pair of stunning setbacks that made it that much easier for the Jamaicans to say the Bird's Nest is really their house.


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[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 16:32:57 GMT]

Keyana Callier, 16, sits outside Central High School in Knoxville, Tenn., on Thursday, Aug. 21, 2008 after a shooting in the school cafeteria. Authorities say a student, was fatally shot during a dispute and a fellow student taken into custody. (AP Photo/ Knoxville News Sentinel, J.Miles Cary)AP - A student fatally shot a 16-year-old classmate during a dispute Thursday at a Knoxville high school, as other teenagers watched in horror as the victim clutched his chest and fell to the floor.


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[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 14:49:18 GMT]
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[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 13:06:48 GMT]

In this March 3, 2006 file photo, former British rocker Gary Glitter smiles at journalists prior to his verdict and sentencing at Ba Ria-Vung, Vung Tau province People's Court in Vietnam. Authorities freed Glitter from prison in southern Vietnam on Tuesday, Aug. 19, 2008, sending the convicted child molester into an uncertain future after nearly three years of confinement. (AP Photo/Richard Vogel, File)AP - Thai police said disgraced rocker Gary Glitter agreed Thursday to leave Thailand for London, possibly ending a two-day odyssey that began when he was released from a Vietnamese prison after serving time for molesting children.


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[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 16:20:38 GMT]

In this Thursday, Jan. 31, 2008 file photo, Gene Upshaw, executive director of the National Football League Players Association, is seen during a news conference, in Phoenix. The Hall of Fame football player and longtime NFL Players Association executive director died according to The NFL players' union. He was 63. The former offensive lineman had been fighting pancreatic cancer. He was 63. Upshaw played with the Oakland and Los Angeles Raiders from 1967 until 1981. He was a seven-time Pro Bowl selection and an 11-time All-Pro. (AP Photo/Morry Gash, FILE)AP - Gene Upshaw, the Hall of Fame guard who during a quarter century as union head helped get NFL players free agency and the riches that came with it, has died. He was 63.


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[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 14:02:34 GMT]

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki (R) meets visiting Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in Baghdad August 21, 2008. (Handout/Iraqi Government/Reuters)Reuters - The United States and Iraq are close to a deal extending the presence of U.S. troops beyond 2008, but any timetable for their withdrawal must be "feasible," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Thursday.


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[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 16:37:51 GMT]

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[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 14:31:16 GMT]

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[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 16:33:40 GMT]

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[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 16:45:19 GMT]

Pakistani police and bomb disposal officials examine the site of a suicide bombing at a gate of Pakistan's ordinance factory in Wah, a garrison city about, 30 km (20 miles) northwest of Islamabad August 21, 2008. Two suicide bombers blew themselves up outside Pakistan's main defence industry complex on Thursday as workers were leaving at the end of their shift, killing nearly 40 people, police said. REUTERS/Faisal Mahmood (PAKISTAN)Reuters - Two Pakistani Taliban suicide bombers blew themselves up outside the country's main defense industry complex on Thursday, killing at least 59 people as workers were leaving at the end of their shift, officials said.


 
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[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 16:31:53 GMT]
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(last updated: Thu, 21 Aug 2008 17:30:10 GMT)		 unfoldmore

Pakistan bombers hit arms factory
[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 16:35:12 GMT]
Pakistan suffers its deadliest attack on a military installation, as suicide bombers kill at least 63 outside a munitions factory.

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[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 14:59:09 GMT]
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(last updated: Thu, 21 Aug 2008 17:20:23 GMT)		 unfoldmore

Taliban bombs kill 59 at Pakistan arms site
[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 15:27:35 GMT]

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[Thu, 21 Aug 2008 15:29:06 GMT]
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Sails raised, colors gleaming, they round up prey.

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Editor in Chief Chris Johns writes about elephants in Africa and their management.

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A man measures the amount of erosion in rural New Mexico.

Your Shot
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Submit your photo, check out Your Shot jigsaw puzzles, and see reader photos that were recently published in National Geographic.

Desktop Wallpaper
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Decorate your desktop with beautiful images from this month's issue of the magazine.

 
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[]
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Sails raised, colors gleaming, they round up prey.

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Women compete in petticoats, bowlers, and bling.

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Uncovering a mysterious Stone Age graveyard.

International Photo Contest
[]
National Geographic's international photo contest will be open for entries starting August 1.

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Editor in Chief Chris Johns writes about elephants in Africa and their management.

Flashback
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A man measures the amount of erosion in rural New Mexico.

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Submit your photo, check out Your Shot jigsaw puzzles, and see reader photos that were recently published in National Geographic.

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Decorate your desktop with beautiful images from this month's issue of the magazine.

 
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