Bush admin. pursues 'change of course' in Iraq

As news of sectarian massacres and increasing US casualties in Iraq have flooded the airwaves before the upcoming elections, the Bush administration and military officials have made a host of public appearances to quell the growing unease over the failing war effort. President Bush delivered an unusual report of the casualties that the US is suffering–voicing a body-count of the 93 US soldiers who had died in Iraq so far this month–at an Oct. 25 press conference in the East Room of the White House. And with this appearance–the first time that he has staged two formal press conferences in one month–the president displayed more candor about the difficulty of the war in Iraq than he has demonstrated before, while insisting that the US is "winning." "We're winning and we will win, unless we leave before the job is done," he said. Bush said that as those fighting US and Iraqi forces change their strategies, the United States is also adjusting its military tactics. Bush's press conference came on the heels of a press conference the day before in Baghdad in which General George Casey, the top US commander in Iraq, said that he might call for an increase in US troop levels in Baghdad as part of efforts to recapture the capital from insurgents and death squads that have pushed killings in the city to some of the highest levels of the war. Casey declined to specify steps to be taken to adjust the Baghdad security plan, which the US command said last week had failed to achieve targets for lowering violence when 7,000 additional US troops, roughly double the number previously deployed here, were assigned to Baghdad in August. At that time, US commanders described the stepped-up bid to regain control of the capital as a critical moment in the war, one that would likely determine its outcome. The general was joined at the news conference by the United States ambassador, and they laid out a timetable for progress that they said has been agreed to by the government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki. Casey defined the objectives as clearing Baghdad of armed gangs and weapons caches neighborhood by neighborhood, then using US and Iraqi troops to hold the areas while the "build" phase, involving hundreds of millions of dollars in economic reconstruction, begins. "Now, do we need more troops to do that?" Casey said. "Maybe. And as I've said all along, if we do, I will ask for the troops we need, both coalition and Iraq[i]." When US commanders refer to coalition forces, they include US troops and contingents from about 30 other nations with soldiers and police units here, most of them involving small troop numbers. But the term is also used to refer solely to US troops, or to the US-trained Iraqi security forces. If more US troops are assigned to the Baghdad operation, on top of the 15,600 already involved, it would mark a further step back, at least in the short term, from plans for a drawdown in overall US troop levels Casey set at the beginning of this year. The plan then was to get down to 100,000 troops by the end of the year, if conditions in the war allowed. But he said the goal of reducing United States troop levels remained central to US strategy here, and that he still hoped to meet the target of having Iraqi forces "completely capable of taking over responsibility for their own security," with a reduced level of US troops in a backup and support role, within 12 to 18 months. But that goal seems far removed from the violence-plagued streets of Iraq's capital, where US forces have taken the lead in trying to protect the city and US soldiers substantially outnumber Iraqi ones. Given the rise in sectarian killings, a Sunni-based insurgency that appears to be as potent as ever and an Iraqi security establishment that continues to have difficulties deploying sufficient numbers of motivated and proficient forces in Baghdad, Casey's target seemed to be an increasingly doubtful assumption. On paper, Iraq has substantial security forces. The Pentagon noted in an August report to Congress that Iraq had more than 277,000 troops and police officers, including some 115,000 army combat soldiers. But those figures, which have often been cited at Pentagon news conferences as an indicator of progress and a potential exit strategy for US troops, paint a distorted picture. When the deep-seated reluctance of many soldiers to serve outside their home regions, leaves of absence and AWOL rates are taken into account, only a portion of the Iraqi Army is readily available for duty in Baghdad and other hot spots. Casey's comments came less than a week after a downbeat assessment of the situation in Baghdad was issued by US military spokesman Major General William Caldwell. "The violence is, indeed, disheartening," he told reporters on Oct. 19. He said that since an additional 12,000 US and Iraqi troops had been poured into Baghdad since August, there had been a 22 percent increase in attacks since the beginning of Ramadan. "Operation Together Forward has made a difference in the focus areas but has not met our overall expectations in sustaining a reduction in the level of violence," Caldwell said. Security efforts are now being "refocused" under the banner of Operation Together Forward II. Caldwell's frank appraisal of the deteriorating situation in Baghdad came a day after President Bush admitted that some parallels could be made between the Iraq War and the war in Vietnam. In a rare one-on-one interview with George Stephanopoulos of ABC News, Bush acknowledged the parallel, saying that insurgents were trying "to inflict enough damage that we'd leave." It is the first admission from the president that similarities may exist between the two conflicts. When talking about Iraq, Bush has until now been keen to avoid references to Vietnam for fear of souring opinion further against the war. Anxiety within the administration and Congress about the evident failures of the war effort has spawned the creation of the Iraq Study Group, which is exploring options for a new Iraq strategy. The panel–led by former secretary of state James Baker–was formed in response to a proposal by members of Congress in March. Baker has hinted at proposed changes in a series of TV interviews, although he does not favor an immediate withdrawal. One, entitled Stability First, calls for continuing to try to stabilize Baghdad, boosting efforts to entice insurgents into politics, and bringing Iran and Syria into plans to end the fighting. The other, called Redeploy and Contain, calls for a gradual, phased withdrawal of US troops to bases outside Iraq where they would be available for military strikes anywhere in the region. It is unclear whether Bush will follow the suggestions brought forth in the study group's report, which is due after the November election. Many of the moves towards a "change in course" on the part of Bush administration have been motivated by a sudden rise in the US casualty rate in Iraq. Ninety-three US soldiers have been killed so far in October, making the month the bloodiest in almost two years. Recently released figures showed that with more US troops being switched to Baghdad to try and secure the city, September saw 776 US soldiers wounded–the highest number since November 2004 when US forces battled to retake the insurgent-held city of Falluja. The US military has said there has been a 43 percent increase in attacks on US and Iraqi forces in the capital since midsummer. Baghdad has now surpassed Anbar as the most hostile place in the country for US and Iraqi forces. The US military reported a daily average of 36.1 attacks in Baghdad for the first 16 days of Ramadan, a spike from the daily average of 28.1 attacks during the previous six weeks. The number of attacks has skyrocketed in the capital since early June, when there were 22.3 attacks per day.