by Gareth Porter, November 16, 2010
(Left: Permanent US Military Bases in Iraq.)
"A special envoy from President Barack Obama raised the possibility in a secret meeting with senior Iraqi military and civilian officials in Baghdad Sept. 23 that his administration would leave more than 15,000 combat troops in Iraq after the 2011 deadline for U.S. withdrawal, according to a senior Iraqi intelligence official familiar with the details of the meeting.
But the White House official, Puneet Talwar, special assistant to the president and senior director for the Gulf States, Iran, and Iraq on the National Security Council (NSC) staff, said the deployment would have to be handled in a way that was consistent the president’s pledge to withdraw U.S. troops completely from Iraq under the 2008 agreement, the official said.
Talwar suggested that the combat troops could be placed under the cover of the State Department’s security force [The Hillary Clinton Brigade??], the Iraqi intelligence official told IPS......
Elements of the U.S. 4th Infantry Division are now deployed in northern Iraq along the line of conflict between Kurds and Arabs, and the U.S. military has been particularly eager to preserve that U.S. military presence there. Last March, Gen. Ray Odierno, the former top U.S. commander in Iraq, raised the possibility of putting U.S. troops along that line under a United Nations peacekeeping mandate.
A U.S. decision to keep combat brigades in Iraq would encourage Maliki to continue take a hard line toward Kurdish aspirations in pursuit of his strategy for consolidating power. It would also bolster his refusal to allow Allawi to gain a share of political power.
And negotiating a new agreement to station U.S. combat brigades in Iraq would risk embroiling the United States in Iraq’s violent ethnic and sectarian conflicts for decades to come. "
(Left: Permanent US Military Bases in Iraq.)
"A special envoy from President Barack Obama raised the possibility in a secret meeting with senior Iraqi military and civilian officials in Baghdad Sept. 23 that his administration would leave more than 15,000 combat troops in Iraq after the 2011 deadline for U.S. withdrawal, according to a senior Iraqi intelligence official familiar with the details of the meeting.
But the White House official, Puneet Talwar, special assistant to the president and senior director for the Gulf States, Iran, and Iraq on the National Security Council (NSC) staff, said the deployment would have to be handled in a way that was consistent the president’s pledge to withdraw U.S. troops completely from Iraq under the 2008 agreement, the official said.
Talwar suggested that the combat troops could be placed under the cover of the State Department’s security force [The Hillary Clinton Brigade??], the Iraqi intelligence official told IPS......
Elements of the U.S. 4th Infantry Division are now deployed in northern Iraq along the line of conflict between Kurds and Arabs, and the U.S. military has been particularly eager to preserve that U.S. military presence there. Last March, Gen. Ray Odierno, the former top U.S. commander in Iraq, raised the possibility of putting U.S. troops along that line under a United Nations peacekeeping mandate.
A U.S. decision to keep combat brigades in Iraq would encourage Maliki to continue take a hard line toward Kurdish aspirations in pursuit of his strategy for consolidating power. It would also bolster his refusal to allow Allawi to gain a share of political power.
And negotiating a new agreement to station U.S. combat brigades in Iraq would risk embroiling the United States in Iraq’s violent ethnic and sectarian conflicts for decades to come. "
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