David Pleasant

Bring the troops home, now.

A senior American military adviser in Baghdad has concluded in an unusually blunt memo that the Iraqi forces suffer from deeply entrenched deficiencies but are now capable of protecting the Iraqi government and that it is time “for the U.S. to declare victory and go home.”

Prepared by Col. Timothy R. Reese, an adviser to the Iraqi military’s Baghdad command, the memorandum asserts that the Iraqi forces have array of problems, including corruption, poor management and the inability to resist political pressure from Shiite political parties.

For all of these problems, however, Colonel Reese argues that Iraqi forces are competent enough to hold off Sunni insurgents, Shiite militias and other internal threats to the Iraqi government. Extending the American military presence in Iraq beyond 2010, he argues, will do little to improve the Iraqis’ military performance while fueling a growing resentment.

The $100 billion a year we spend in Iraq would pay for health care reform. But who will win this debate, Haliburton or the American people? I guess we’ll see just how much President Cheney is still controlling the levers of power.

Late Update: It should come as no surprise that the Council on Foreign Relations is cheering to stay there. Why didn’t the NYT just ask Bill Kristol what he thought was best?

Some experts, such as Stephen Biddle, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations…have argued that this timetable may be too fast given the host of remaining problems in Iraq, including differences between Kurds and Arab leaders, remaining Sunni-Shiite tensions and the possibility that the government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki might become more authoritarian.

Late Update: Trusting what is published in major media outlets is becoming increasingly difficult, if not downright impossible. The credibility of the NYT’s lead story (as of now) about getting out Iraq early based on the “analysis” of Col. Timothy R. Reese is called into question by Zachary Roth at TPM.

I thought we elected Barack Obama President of the United States, not General Ray Odierno, who seems to have his own plan for Iraq.

The top American commander in Iraq said Saturday that some soldiers would remain in a support role in cities beyond summer 2009, when a new security agreement calls for the removal of American combat troops from urban areas.

The commander, Gen. Ray Odierno, said American troops would remain at numerous security outposts in order to help support and train Iraqi forces. “We believe that’s part of our transition teams,” he told reporters in Balad while accompanying Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, who arrived on an unannounced trip Saturday.

General Odierno declined to say how many American troops might remain in Iraqi cities past the summer and said the number still remained to be negotiated with the Iraqi government under the terms of the so-called status of forces agreement. “But what I would say is we’ll maintain our very close partnership with the Iraqi security forces throughout Iraq even after the summer.”