Posted on 01/10/2007 2:30:20 PM PST by STARWISE
Preview of tonight's speech [Mona Charen] Based on a just-completed White House background briefing, it looks like the President’s new Iraq strategy to be unveiled tonight looks promising.
The Administration recognizes a lot of what has gone wrong, for example, that is was unrealistic to assume that political progress could be made while the security situation remained so ghastly. The new emphasis is on security first. Five new American brigades will be sent to Baghdad to work with new Iraqi brigades securing the capital block by block. Unclear whether this will be sufficient force. Rules of engagement also to change so that there will be no more areas off limits to American forces.
The President also plans to ask for a larger army – a little late and so necessary! It will be interesting to see how the Democrats in Congress handle that one. All that talk of supporting the troops. . .
Possible problem areas: the strategy still depends heavily on Maliki’s bona fides. They believe his heart is the right place but he has suffered from lack of “capabilities.” That’s a gamble. There is also a “regional” component to the new strategy that seems to rely on another push for Israeli/Palestinian cooperation (Rice is traveling to Middle East within the week). That sounds like Baker/Hamilton bunk, but let’s see what she says.
Still, most of it sounds exactly right.
It will be from the Whitehouse library, which is on the 1st floor, I think.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/whtour/library.html
((((Hugs)))
I like that part
Bush Speech to Detail Retooled Iraq Plan
In speech, Bush to detail plan to send 21,500 more troops to Iraq; Dems pledge a confrontation
WASHINGTON, Jan. 10, 2007
By JENNIFER LOVEN Associated Press Writer
(AP) President Bush will tell a nation weary of war Wednesday night that he is sending 21,500 more Americans to Iraq, arguing it has been a mistake not to commit larger numbers of U.S and Iraqi troops to stabilize the increasingly violent, shattered country. Democrats pledged to confront Bush over the troop escalation set to begin next week.
Unveiling his retooled war strategy in a pivotal prime-time address from the White House, the president will acknowledge in unusually stark terms how dire the situation is _ because of errors in U.S. assumptions and failures by the government in Iraq to follow through on promises.
The U.S. is changing its goals, switching from a focus on training Iraqi security forces to securing the battered population and targeting economic aid toward seats of the worst violence. Bush, meanwhile, is putting the onus on the Iraqis to meet their responsibilities and take the lead in the fighting, but without the threat of specific consequences if they do not.
"The Iraqis have to step up," White House counselor Dan Bartlett said.
Bartlett said that the rules of the past, where for instance U.S. forces in Baghdad "sometimes were handcuffed by political interference by the Iraqi leadership," must end.
"They (the Iraqis) are going to have more boots on the ground," he said. "They're going to be the ones doing the knocking on the door."
Democrats, emboldened by November elections that put them in charge on Capitol Hill in part over the war, laid plans to register their opposition to the troop buildup.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she would call a vote on the increase, trying to isolate Bush and put Republicans on the spot. Democratic leaders in the Senate also said they would schedule a debate next week on a symbolic measure expressing opposition.
"American voters expect us to help get us out of Iraq," said Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., a 2008 presidential hopeful and chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee that heard independent experts on Iraq.
Republicans, too, were restless. "I do not want to embarrass the president, but I do not support a surge" in troops, said Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., who said he had told Bush as much last week.
After nearly four years of fighting, $400 billion and thousands of American and Iraqi lives lost, approval of the president's handling of the war hit a record low of 27 percent in December, according to an AP-Ipsos poll.
Bush was to acknowledge a long and worsened list of problems in Iraq: the government's capabilities still are limited, sectarian divisions have widened, members of Iraqi security forces are contributing to the violence and suffer from high absenteeism, fighting in Baghdad between Shiites and Sunnis has increased and is influencing the rest of the country, essential services still are lacking, Iraqi support for the U.S. is declining, and Iraqis _ while committed to a unified country _ are increasingly turning from the central government to pursue more narrow sectarian agendas to hedge their bets.
The president is arguing that a gradual increase in U.S. troops, opposed by some key military leaders as a potentially ineffective strain on the armed forces, is the answer _ along with pumping an extra $1 billion into Iraq's faltering economy.
His justification rests in part on the conclusion that while Iraqis must take responsibility for ending sectarian fighting, they don't have the resources to do it alone. The White House is confident al-Maliki is better able to follow through on promises of the kind that have been made before and never kept. Bush also will urge Americans who he knows are impatient to see success in Iraq as imperative to their future security.
A breakdown of the additional troops was provided by a senior administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the increase has not been officially announced:
_Bush is committing 17,500 U.S. combat troops to Baghdad. The first of five brigades will arrive by next Monday. The next is to arrive by Feb. 15 and the reminder will go in 30-day increments.
_The president is committing 4,000 more Marines to Anbar Province, a base of the Sunni insurgency and foreign al-Qaida fighters.
_The Iraqis are committing three brigades for Baghdad, the first to be delivered on Feb. 1. Two more will arrive on Feb. 15th.
Al-Maliki has assured Bush that Shiite militias that have been terrorizing the Sunni minority in Baghdad will not be immune. "This is going to be an operation in Baghdad that will make no difference between Shiite, Sunni or other types of illegal militia or illegal activity," Bartlett said.
Bush will link the U.S. troop infusion to other steps by the Shiite-led Iraqi government, such as enacting a plan to distribute oil revenue to all the country's sects, easing restrictions on government posts for Sunni members of deposed leader Saddam Hussein's Baath Party and committing $10 billion of its own money for reconstruction.
The White House anticipates that stability in Baghdad can be achieved by summer, so that U.S. troops will be able to pull back to areas outside the capital. Iraqis were expected to be in control of security in all 18 of Iraq's provinces by November, the official said.
The president is ignoring a key recommendation of the bipartisan, independent Iraq Study Group, that he solicit help from Syria and Iran, the official said. Instead, he will call for increased operations against nations meddling in Iraq, aimed at Iran and, to a lesser degree, Syria.
Among other steps by the United States are a doubling of an existing reconstruction program focused on helping communities outside the international zone in Baghdad and a call for friendly Mideast nations to increase support for Iraq.
The president's address is the centerpiece of an aggressive public relations campaign that also includes detailed briefings for lawmakers and a series of appearances by Bush starting with a trip Thursday to Fort Benning, Ga. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice heads to the Mideast a day after appearing with Defense Secretary Robert Gates at Democratically convened Iraq hearings on Thursday.
While Bush considered his options over nearly three months, the number of U.S. military deaths in Iraq passed 3,000, and Saddam was hanged for atrocities committed under his leadership.
___
On the Net:
White House: http://www.whitehouse.gov
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/01/10/ap/politics/mainD8MIJN900.shtml
Fantastic news!
I hope this means the military is allowed to Break things again...
Thank you!
"Rules of engagement also to change so that there will be no more areas off limits to American forces."
This is a real relief to hear, hope it's so.
Saw on FNC - just a breaking news crawler - that Maliki had told Muqtada Al Sadr that his Mahdi army must immediately and fully disarm. If they fail to do so, the Iraqi army, supported by US troops would forcably disarm them! Sounds like our president had a chat with Maliki, huh?
You're welcome.
Here's something else most people don't realize happened, almost exactly 56 years ago.
Full Wartime Censorship Placed on Korean War News
Waterloo Daily Courier, front page | January 9, 1951 | UP
U. S. Eighth Army headquarters, Korea. –(UP) –
The US.Eighth Army imposed full wartime censorship on news coverage of the Korean War Tuesday and threatened to courtmartial newsmen who deliberately report any troop movements without authorization. [snip][more about the censorship rules at the FR link at the head of this article]The rules placed correspondents under the complete jusrisdiction of the army and forbade any criticism of the Allied conduct of the war.
The regulations, succeeding the present security censorship, provide that all dispatches filed to publications throughout the world will be screened for military information which might injure the morale of UN troops or their government.
It's odd how often that happens. My Grandfather died thirty-something odd years to the day after my Uncle was murdered.
One thing we need to think about is that ABC News has already been on the radio all day saying that Pres. Bush is going to apologize for STARTING the war...
From what I have heard, he is only going to apologize for not putting enough troops in Baghdad that first time..
Also...they are going to have the "rules of engagement" handcuffs taken off..and they can FIGHT NOW!!
At least that is what I heard Mary Matalin say...
In order to get a Badger out of it's hole, you have to go in there and make it happen face to face. This operation will be just that. The Iraqi security forces will be tagging along to secure the smoke and rubble that the Worlds most deadly fighting force leaves behind them.
Can you spell SWEEP?
My wife said she saw a list of the first 5 brigades on the TV but couldn't tell me who they were. Anyone catch the list?
NOT!
My father lived precisely the same number of days as his father -- 78 years, 10 months, 21 days. Freaky. I'm determined to break the cycle.
Steven R. Hurst And Qassim Abdul-Zahra, Canadian Press
Published: Wednesday, January 10, 2007
BAGHDAD (AP) - Iraq's prime minister has told Mahdi Army militiamen they must surrender their arms or face an all-out assault by U.S.-backed Iraqi forces, senior Iraqi officials said Wednesday, revealing a pledge Washington wanted to hear as American and Iraqi troops prepared a fresh operation to end the bloody sectarian war gripping Baghdad.
The blunt message was particularly significant given that Nouri al-Maliki, the Iraqi leader, previously had blocked several U.S. attempts to crack down on the military wing of radical anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, now one of the most powerful players in Iraq.
"Prime Minister al-Maliki has told everyone that there will be no escape from attack. The government has told the Sadrists (the political movement that supports the Mahdi Army), if we want to build a state we have no other choice but to attack armed groups," a senior Shiite legislator and close al-Maliki adviser said.
While the militia has been noticeably less active since the Dec. 30 hanging of Saddam Hussein, there was no assurance the threatened offensive would intimidate the fighters who have only grown stronger in numbers, arms and sophistication since they battled U.S. forces to a standstill in the Shiite holy city of Najaf and in Baghdad's Sadr City in 2004.
The Iraqi military is bringing two brigades from northern Iraq and one from the south to increase troop strength for the new Baghdad security push that al-Maliki announced on Saturday. He immediately set it in motion with an attack on Sunni insurgents in Haifa Street in central Baghdad. Thirty suspected insurgents were killed then and 50 more were reported killed Tuesday in a nearly day-long assault there backed by U.S. troops, fighter jets and attack helicopters.
Tens of thousands of Iraqis have died in the 3½ years since the U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam. The war has cost Americans hundreds of billions of dollars and more than 3,000 lives.
While putting the Mahdi Army on notice, al-Maliki has avoided any public comment on a set of political and economic benchmarks by the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush for the Iraqi government to set out a plan for sharing the country's oil wealth, modifying de-Baathification rules, conducting provincial elections and moving quickly on constitutional amendments. All those issues are critically important to drawing Sunnis into the political process.
An Iraqi general, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the details had not been released, said a mainly Kurdish force from one of the northern Iraqi brigades would be sent into Sadr City, the Shiite slum in northeast Baghdad that is headquarters of the Mahdi Army.
The general said Kurds, who are Sunni but not Arab, were being used against the Shiite Mahdi Army to overcome the predicted refusal by soldiers from other Iraqi units to fight fellow Shiites. An estimated 80 per cent of the Iraqi army is Shiite.
The primary target of the campaign to emasculate militant groups would focus on the Shiite Mahdi Army and the Sunni extremists in the group "al-Qaida in Iraq" and two of its allied groups, the Ansar al-Sunnah Army and the Omar Brigade, the general said.
Iraqi and U.S. officials said the new Baghdad security plan would be under the control of Iraqi commanders, one each for nine districts in the city. Each commander would operate independently of Iraqi military headquarters. The Americans planned to put 400 to 600 U.S. soldiers in each district as a backup force, a senior Bush administration official said Wednesday. Others would be held in reserve throughout the capital to quickly deploy on the request of Iraqi commanders.
Al-Maliki has named an Iraqi general who was taken as prisoner of war by U.S. troops during the 1991 Gulf war as the overall commander of the new security operation.
Lt.-Gen. Aboud Gambar, a Shiite, will have two assistants, one from the police and one from the army, the military officers said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to reveal the information.
Gambar will report directly to al-Maliki, the commander general of the armed forces.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.