U.S. Is Sending Reserve Troops to Iraq's West
May 30, 2006
The New York Times
By DAVID S. CLOUD
WASHINGTON, May 29 — The top American commander in Iraq has decided to move reserve troops now deployed in Kuwait into the volatile Anbar Province in western Iraq to help quell a rise in insurgent attacks there, two American officials said Monday.
Although some soldiers from the 3,500-member brigade in Kuwait have moved into Iraq in recent months, Gen. George W. Casey Jr. has decided to send in the remainder of the unit after consultations with Iraqi officials in recent days, the officials said.
The confirmation that the number of American forces in Iraq would grow came on a day of soaring violence in Baghdad. Two Britons working as members of a CBS News television crew were killed on Monday and an American correspondent for the network was critically wounded when a military patrol they were accompanying was hit by a roadside bomb. (Related Article)
The movement of the brigade comes as several senior American officials in Iraq have begun to raise doubts about whether security conditions there will permit significant troop reductions in coming months.
"General Casey has been working with the government of Iraq, and he has asked permission to draw forward more forces that will be operating in Anbar," a senior military official said. The officials were granted anonymity because they were not authorized to talk officially about continuing troop movements.
The brigade comes from the Army's First Armored Division, which has been deployed in Kuwait for months as a reserve in case conditions in Iraq deteriorated. One official said the additional troops would be deployed at multiple hotspots in Anbar Province, a Sunni insurgent stronghold west of Baghdad.
At least some of the troops are likely to be sent to the city of Ramadi, where a Pennsylvania National Guard brigade that has been trying to quell a surge in violence in the city along with Marine units is scheduled to rotate out this month.
The deployment was first reported in the Tuesday issue of The Washington Post.
Several senior officers in Ramadi have said in recent interviews that they are engaged in almost daily combat and that Al Qaeda has been recruiting local residents to carry out assassinations of local sheiks and officials who cooperate with American forces.
For the past year, Defense Department officials have said Gen. John P. Abizaid, the top commander in the region, and General Casey, the senior officer in Iraq, were considering options for reducing troop levels this year if security and political conditions improved, including dropping to about 100,000 total, from the approximately 133,000 there now. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and other top administration officials have continued to express hope in recent weeks that troop cuts would be possible.
One senior American commander said recently that military officials still remain hopeful that they can reduce the troop presence in Iraq by 25 percent by the end of the year, but he admitted that there was no timetable and much of that hope rests on the performance of the fledgling Iraqi government in coming months.
How much the decision to deploy the entire reserve brigade from Kuwait will increase the total number of American troops in Iraq and for how long was unclear. Nor is it clear how the additional troops will be employed as commanders seek to quell the violence in Anbar in coming months.
One official said the additional troops would be deployed to "fill in the gaps" that now exist and that will get worse when the Pennsylvania Guard unit pulls out.
The top commander in the province, Gen. Richard Zilmer of the Marines, said in an interview last month that a large-scale assault on insurgents in Ramadi, similar to block-by-block fighting by the Marines in nearby Falluja in 2004, was not under consideration. Instead, he said, the Marines expect more targeted actions against insurgents in the city.
Link:
U.S. Moves 1,500 Reserve Troops to Iraq
The New York Times
By DAVID S. CLOUD
WASHINGTON, May 29 — The top American commander in Iraq has decided to move reserve troops now deployed in Kuwait into the volatile Anbar Province in western Iraq to help quell a rise in insurgent attacks there, two American officials said Monday.
Although some soldiers from the 3,500-member brigade in Kuwait have moved into Iraq in recent months, Gen. George W. Casey Jr. has decided to send in the remainder of the unit after consultations with Iraqi officials in recent days, the officials said.
The confirmation that the number of American forces in Iraq would grow came on a day of soaring violence in Baghdad. Two Britons working as members of a CBS News television crew were killed on Monday and an American correspondent for the network was critically wounded when a military patrol they were accompanying was hit by a roadside bomb. (Related Article)
The movement of the brigade comes as several senior American officials in Iraq have begun to raise doubts about whether security conditions there will permit significant troop reductions in coming months.
"General Casey has been working with the government of Iraq, and he has asked permission to draw forward more forces that will be operating in Anbar," a senior military official said. The officials were granted anonymity because they were not authorized to talk officially about continuing troop movements.
The brigade comes from the Army's First Armored Division, which has been deployed in Kuwait for months as a reserve in case conditions in Iraq deteriorated. One official said the additional troops would be deployed at multiple hotspots in Anbar Province, a Sunni insurgent stronghold west of Baghdad.
At least some of the troops are likely to be sent to the city of Ramadi, where a Pennsylvania National Guard brigade that has been trying to quell a surge in violence in the city along with Marine units is scheduled to rotate out this month.
The deployment was first reported in the Tuesday issue of The Washington Post.
Several senior officers in Ramadi have said in recent interviews that they are engaged in almost daily combat and that Al Qaeda has been recruiting local residents to carry out assassinations of local sheiks and officials who cooperate with American forces.
For the past year, Defense Department officials have said Gen. John P. Abizaid, the top commander in the region, and General Casey, the senior officer in Iraq, were considering options for reducing troop levels this year if security and political conditions improved, including dropping to about 100,000 total, from the approximately 133,000 there now. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and other top administration officials have continued to express hope in recent weeks that troop cuts would be possible.
One senior American commander said recently that military officials still remain hopeful that they can reduce the troop presence in Iraq by 25 percent by the end of the year, but he admitted that there was no timetable and much of that hope rests on the performance of the fledgling Iraqi government in coming months.
How much the decision to deploy the entire reserve brigade from Kuwait will increase the total number of American troops in Iraq and for how long was unclear. Nor is it clear how the additional troops will be employed as commanders seek to quell the violence in Anbar in coming months.
One official said the additional troops would be deployed to "fill in the gaps" that now exist and that will get worse when the Pennsylvania Guard unit pulls out.
The top commander in the province, Gen. Richard Zilmer of the Marines, said in an interview last month that a large-scale assault on insurgents in Ramadi, similar to block-by-block fighting by the Marines in nearby Falluja in 2004, was not under consideration. Instead, he said, the Marines expect more targeted actions against insurgents in the city.
Link:
U.S. Moves 1,500 Reserve Troops to Iraq
posted by HRM Deborah of Israel and the Messenger of Peace at 7:31 PM
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