WASHINGTON, Nov. 15 (UPI) -- More U.S. troops will not improve the security situation in Iraq, the general in charge of U.S. Central Command said Wednesday.
Gen. John Abizaid told the Armed Services Committee of the U.S. Senate that more American troops would give the Iraqis an excuse not to confront the security situation themselves.
"It's easy for the Iraqis to rely upon us to do this work. I believe that more American forces prevent the Iraqis from doing more, from taking more responsibility for their own future. They will win the insurgency, they will solve the sectarian violence problem, and they'll do it with our help," Abizaid said in a tense exchange with Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., about troop levels.
Abizaid also said the U.S. Army and Marine Corps do not have enough troops to sustain a larger force in Iraq for very long.
"We can put in 20,000 more Americans tomorrow and achieve a temporary effect. But when you look at the overall American force pool that's available out there, the ability to sustain that commitment is simply not something that we have right now with the size of the Army and the Marine Corps," Abizaid said.
He said he was considering all options, however -- from adding troops to withdrawing completely, or repositioning them around or within Iraq. None has yet been decided on, and he asked that Congress not impose timetables or withdrawal requirements on him.
"At this stage in the campaign, we'll need flexibility to manage our force and to help manage the Iraqi force. Force caps and specific time tables limit that flexibility," he said.
"It's not that we're absolutely not considering force increases," Abizaid said. "We will. But it seems to me that the prudent course ahead is (to) keep the troop levels about where they are, increase the number of forces that are with Iraqi security forces to make them better, more confident, and, in conjunction with our colleagues on the diplomatic side, move towards governance policies that will seek reconciliation," he said.
Abizaid said the violence in Iraq was not as bad as it was in August and September but it remained threateningly high. He warned that the United States and the Iraqi government have only four to six months to quell sectarian violence and disband the militias before the situation slips irrevocably into chaos.
"I think (Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki) must move against the Sadr militia if Iraq is to become a free and sovereign and independent state," Abizais said, referring to the Mahdi Army or Jaysh al-Mahdi, believed to be the most powerful and threatening Shiite militia in Iraq.
Abizaid said the Iraqi government had to take steps quickly against the Mahdi Army, or risk that the group will morph into a destructive political and military power similar to Hezbollah in Lebanon, but on a far larger scale.
Abizaid said he had discussed the matter with Maliki and that he believed Maliki would take the steps necessary to disarm the militia and get its fighters jobs and enough political power to maintain their disarmament.
The current U.S. military estimate is that Iraqi security forces will be able to take lead across their country in 12 to 18 months, but Abizaid said efforts were underway to speed that transition. Only when Iraqis were leading the fight could the insurgency be brought under control, he said.
However, that meant that the United States had to invest more manpower and resources into the coalition military transition teams, speed the delivery of logistics and mobility enablers, and embrace an aggressive Iraqi-led effort to disarm illegal militias, Abizaid said.
It also meant the Shiite-controlled Maliki government had to fully support its security forces against the Shiite militias, he said.
"Will they be backed up in the event of a showdown? Do they have the capability to deal with them?" Abizaid said. "We need to make sure the (government forces) are the paramount force in the country."
"I have confidence that the Iraqi army is up to the job, providing the Iraqi government shows the confidence in its own army and gives support to its own army to take the lead the way that they should. That has yet to be demonstrated," he said.
Abizaid said he was considering adding more U.S. troops, but only if they were required to bolster the size of the military training teams embedded with Iraqi battalions. Each team now has between 10 and 15 members.
Abizaid said he remains optimistic Iraq can be stabilized. "We must stick with it until such time they show us that they can't do it," he said. "Those among us who fight bet on the Iraqis."
Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., pointed out that much of the Iraq policy depends on hoping the Iraqi government will pull itself together politically, economically and militarily to tackle its own problems.
"Hope is not a method," she said.
Abizaid responded: "Despair is not a method either... They are not despairing. They believe they can move their country to stability and I believe it."
He said optimistic projections over the previous years about where Iraq would be by now -- which had not come true -- were not lies or obfuscation. "We haven't misled people. We have learned some hard lessons," he said.
Abizaid also said the maligned former Army Chief of Staff Gen. Eric Shinseki was right: the United States should have sent several hundred thousand troops to keep order in Iraq after the invasion. Then-Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz immediately derided that estimate, calling it "wildly off the mark."
"I think you can look back and say that more American troops would have been advisable in the early stages of May, June, July (2003)," Abizaid told the committee.
