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Army chief says US ready to be in Iraq 10 years
(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-05-27 07:54 The United States currently has about 139,000 troops in Iraq and 52,000 in Afghanistan. Obama campaigned on ending the Iraq war as quickly as possible and refocusing US resources on what he called the more important fight in Afghanistan. That will not mean a major influx of US fighting forces on the model of the Iraq "surge," however. Obama has agreed to send about 21,000 combat forces and trainers to Afghanistan this year. Combined with additional forces approved before former President George W. Bush left office, the United States is expected to have about 68,000 troops in Afghanistan by the end of this year. That's about double the total at the end of 2008, but Obama's top military and civilian advisers have indicated the number is unlikely to grow much beyond that. Casey said several times that he wasn't the person making policy, but the military was preparing to have a fighting force deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan for years to come. Casey said his planning envisions 10 combat brigades plus command and support forces committed to the two wars. When asked whether the Army had any measurement for knowing how big it should be, Casey responded, "How about the reality scenario?" This scenario, he said, must take into account that "we're going to have 10 Army and Marine units deployed for a decade in Iraq and Afghanistan." Casey stressed that the United States must be ready to take on sustained fights in the Middle East while meeting other commitments. Casey reiterated statements made by civilian and military leaders that the situation in Afghanistan would get worse before it gets better. "There's going to be a big fight in the South," he said. Casey added that training of local police and military in Afghanistan was at least a couple years behind the pace in Iraq, and it would be months before the US deployed enough trainers. There's a steeper curve before training could be effective in Afghanistan, requiring three to five years before Afghanis could reach the "tipping point" of control. He also said the US had to be careful about what assets get deployed to Afghanistan. "Anything you put in there would be in there for a decade," he said. As Army chief of staff, Casey is primarily responsible for assembling the manpower and determining assignments. He insisted the Army's 1.1-million size was sufficient even to handle the extended Mideast conflicts. "We ought to build a pretty effective Army with 1.1 million strength," Casey said. He also noted that the Army's budget had grown to $220 billion from $68 billion before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. He said the Army is two-thirds of the way through a complete overhaul from the Cold War-era force built around tanks and artillery to today's terrorist-driven realities. The Army has become more versatile and quicker by switching from division-led units to brigade-level command. Casey said the Army has moved from 15-month battlefield deployments to 12 months. His goal is to move rotations by 2011 to one year in the battlefield and two years out for regular Army troops, and one year in the battlefield and three years out for reserves. He called the current one-year-in-one-year-out cycle "unsustainable."
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