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Abizaid Asks to Maintain Higher Force Level in Iraq By Jim GaramoneAmerican Forces Press ServiceWASHINGTON, May 4, 2004 – An Army brigade and two Marine expeditionary units will replace units of the 1st Armored Division and the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment in Iraq, Defense, Joint Staff and Army officials said. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld told reporters today at a DoD news briefing that he has approved Army Gen. John Abizaid's request to keep the number of U.S. troops in Iraq at between 135,000 and 138,000. In April, Abizaid, head of U.S. Central Command, asked for additional troops. DoD...

<p>The commander of U.S. forces in Iraq said yesterday the fighting in the country has been the toughest in months, but added that no more troops are needed unless fighting there intensifies.</p> <p>Army Gen. John Abizaid, commander of the U.S. Central Command, said in a video interview from Qatar that the "fighting in Iraq this month has been more intense than at any time since the major combat operations of March and April of last year."</p>

President Bush should be sending yellow roses to Gen. Eric Shinseki and begging him to come back. Before the war in Iraq, General Shinseki, then the Army chief of staff, said that Mr. Bush was going to need "several hundred thousand" soldiers to occupy and stabilize the country. The general was denounced by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's civilian team and then ushered into retirement. Mr. Bush clung to Mr. Rumsfeld's misguided idea that a minimal force could not only capture Baghdad but could also hold, stabilize and rebuild an entire country. Mr. Rumsfeld was right about the lightning strike...

US military may need to send more troops to Iraq: Myers 5 minutes ago Add Politics - AFP to My Yahoo! WASHINGTON (AFP) - The US military may need to send more troops to Iraq (news - web sites) to combat "serious" insurgent violence, the top US general said, warning that the costs of military operations also are climbing. AFP/Getty Images Photo Latest headlines: · US military may need to send more troops to Iraq: MyersAFP - 8 minutes ago · Shreds of text books and lost dreams in Basra blastsAFP - 10 minutes ago · Bush Pledges to Guide...

US President George W. Bush is today expected to announce a massive injection of extra troops into Iraq in a bid to quell American unease about the deteriorating security in the country. Overnight the US also foreshadowed a major offensive against the militia of radical Shiite Muslim cleric, Moqtada al-Sadr. US troops arrested al-Sadr's chief aide Sheikh Hazem al-Araji as he was leaving a television interview in a Baghdad hotel last night. In a rare press conference today, Mr Bush will attempt to convince Americans - and the world - that not only must the coalition presence in Iraq continue,...

<p>WASHINGTON, April 12 (UPI) -- U.S. Central Command chief Gen. John Abizaid has asked the Pentagon for another 6,000 to 10,000 troops for Iraq, he told reporters Monday.</p> <p>"What I've asked for is essentially to have a strong mobile combat arms capability. That's about, probably, two brigades worth of combat power, if not more," said Abizaid, speaking to reporters from Baghdad.</p>

<p>BAGHDAD, April 12 -- Top U.S. military commanders expressed disappointment Monday with the performance of Iraqi security forces in countering an intensifying insurgency and said they were requesting thousands of additional U.S. forces to meet the threat.</p> <p>The commanders said two U.S. soldiers and seven employees of the American construction company Kellogg Brown and Root were missing in Iraq after an attack on a convoy near Baghdad's airport Friday. A statement issued Monday by the firm's parent company, Halliburton, confirmed that seven employees were missing, including Thomas Hamill, a truck driver from Mississippi. The identities of the six others were not disclosed.</p>

Key U.S. Senator Says More Troops Needed in Iraq Falluja Truce Extended to Monday - Iraq Official Bush Prays with Troops After 'Tough Week' in Iraq FBI Must Explain 70 Probes Before 9/11-Panelists MORE WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States must increase the number of its troops in Iraq as well as the size of the U.S. Army and Marine Corps overall to face up to the challenges in Iraq, Sen. John McCain said on Sunday. "It's obvious that we're paying a heavy price, I think, for not having had enough troops there from the beginning," the Arizona Republican said...

<p>The top commander in the Persian Gulf has decided he needs more troops than originally planned for this phase of the Iraq occupation, but will find them among troops already deployed in his region of operation, senior defense officials say.</p>

WASHINGTON, April 9 (UPI) -- U.S. Central Command chief Gen. John Abizaid has requested more forces for Iraq and was discussing plans Friday with U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, a senior defense official confirmed. Abizaid told reporters in Iraq he wanted several thousand more troops, and indicated they may come from the 3rd Infantry Division, which only returned from its last Iraq deployment six months ago. Pentagon officials said it was unlikely the 3rd ID would be called up so quickly. The senior defense official said Abizaid's request was too specific for a warfighting commander to make. The forces Abizaid...

Generals weary of low troop levels April 8, 2004 BY ROBERT NOVAK SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST The New York Times Book Review of last Sunday received unusual attention in the Pentagon's corridors this week. The review of In the Company of Soldiers by Washington Post war correspondent Rick Atkinson reveals the ridiculously low estimate made by the Pentagon's civilian leadership of troops needed in Iraq. Those words echoed eerily amid news of open fighting in Baghdad between U.S. troops and Shiite militia. In the afterword following his brilliant account of the actual war, Atkinson wrote: ''Pentagon planners in early May had predicted...

When Republicans on the House Armed Services Committee last year broke rank with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and called for a boost in troop levels, the Pentagon chief didn't fret. He began twisting arms. It worked. In legislation newly introduced to add troops, sponsor Rep. Ellen Tauscher, California Democrat, can't find a single GOP cosponsor.

<p>Taking on critics in Congress who say America needs a bigger Army, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Tuesday the military is under strain but he is not yet convinced a permanent expansion is in the best interests of the Pentagon or taxpayers.</p>

New York – "We may need a bigger army," Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld tells TIME in this week's Person of the Year double issue (on newsstands for two weeks beginning Monday, Dec. 22). Rumsfeld has been under pressure from Congress to expand the military by at least two divisions, or 20,000 troops, TIME Washington Bureau Chief Michael Duffy and Pentagon Correspondent Mark Thompson report. The Secretary resisted that pressure over the summer and fall, but in his conversation with TIME, he said he was studying it more closely now, opening the door to a deal. Rumsfeld tells TIME: "I...

WASHINGTON — Members of Congress from both parties are pushing for the first significant increase in the size of the active-duty military in 16 years, despite resistance from the Pentagon. Call-ups of part-time troops from the Army National Guard and the Army Reserve to fill the ranks in Iraq have intensified the bipartisan sentiment that the Pentagon doesn't have enough troops to fight an extended war on terrorism while keeping enough well-rested, well-trained troops ready for an emergency. "Momentum is building in Congress for" an increase, says Harald Stavenas, a spokesman for Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., chairman of the House...

When U.S. and British forces got bogged down last March in their run to Baghdad, legislators, media pundits, and armchair strategists claimed that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld had skimped on troops. The decisive victory that followed silenced them. But now that our reconstruction efforts are encountering resistance by die-hard Baathists, foreign fundamentalists, and other assorted ne'er-do-wells, those same critics are now claiming that things would be a lot quieter in Iraq if we had listened to their advice and sent a bigger army to do the job. Not so. The critics are compounding their earlier error with new ones. In...

In Iraq+ En Route or Alerted+ United States 130,000 future 15,000+ Britain 11,000 OTHER COUNTRIES: Albania 100 Australia 1,000 Bulgaria 470 Czech Rep. 706 Denmark 410 90 Dominican Rep. 300 El Salvador 360 Estonia future 50 Honduras 370 Hungary 300 Italy (inc. Romanian & Portuguese elements) 3,400 Kazakhstan 25 Latvia 142 Lithuania 193 Macedonia 28 Mongolia 180 Netherlands 1,100 New Zealand 61 Nicaragua 230 Norway 104 Philippines 95 Poland 2,400 Romania 400 Singapore 192 Slovakia 69 future 120 South Korea 675 Spain 1,300 Thailand 450

<p>Several thousand additional Marines will go to Iraq next year, the Pentagon said yesterday in an update that indicated the total U.S. force won't be reduced as much as planned.</p> <p>Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld also approved the mobilization of 9,900 Army, 1,290 Navy and 3,208 Air Force Reserve personnel for the rotation, which will begin in January to replace the 130,000 troops who will be completing one-year tours of duty in Iraq.</p>

Bush hints at sending more troops to Iraq By Rupert Cornwell in Washington 22 November 2003 President George Bush has raised the possibility that next year American troop strength in Iraq might be increased, rather than reduced, if the fraught security in the country requires it. Donald Rumsfeld, the Defence Secretary, and other senior administration officials have left little doubt US forces will remain in Iraq, even after the accelerated handover of most authority to a provisional Iraqi government in mid-2004. But the Pentagon's plan, under a complicated rotation system announced last month, is for total troop strength in Iraq...

President George Bush blindsided the Pentagon in London Thursday, saying if more troops were needed in Iraq, they would be sent. That contradicted earlier Pentagon statements claiming the goal was to reduce troop strength, and reportedly startled both National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice and Secretary of State Colin Powell at the news conference. "We could have less troops in Iraq. We could have the same number of troops in Iraq. We could have more troops in Iraq. Whatever is necessary to secure Iraq," Bush said. He said there are now 130,000 Iraqis trained to work in the army, security, intelligence...