<http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/12/20/us.generals.ap/> Generals expected to be shuffled, as Iraq policy shifts POSTED: 11:12 a.m. EST, December 20, 2006
WASHINGTON (AP) -- A shuffle of top American generals in Iraq is likely to accompany the shift in U.S. policy that President Bush is considering.
Army Gen. John P. Abizaid, commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East, has submitted plans to go ahead with a retirement that is months overdue, according to the U.S. Central Command.
And the top U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. George Casey, has indicated in recent months that he also may not stay much longer than the end of this year.
Since they have opposed sending more troops to Iraq, their departures could make it easier for Bush and his new Defense Secretary Robert Gates to switch course in the troubled campaign, where they are considering a short-term surge in forces.
Abizaid's three-year tour as commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East was to have ended last July, but he agreed to stay until early 2007 at the request of former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, said a Central Command statement from Tampa, Florida.
The changes, both rumored before Rumsfeld's announced resignation and Gates' nomination, would allow Gates to choose his own commanders for Iraq, the issue he has said will be his top priority as secretary.
Abizaid, long considered a voice of candor, told a Senate committee last month that the number of troops deployed to Iraq should not be increased or decreased sharply. Instead, the United States should focus on accelerating the training of Iraqi forces, so they can be pushed front and center into battle, he said. (Watch how Iraq's deteriorating situation has escalated debate over whether to increase troop levels Video)
His remarks provided no help to lawmakers hoping for big changes in Iraq policy following elections in which Democrats were handed control of Congress by Americans angry over the course of the war.
The opposition to a bigger force in Iraq now also appears to be out of step with the White House, which says it is considering sending more U.S. troops to try to get spiraling violence under control. (Full story)
Abizaid and other generals worry that sending thousands of additional troops temporarily to Iraq could be ineffective without bold new political and economic steps. And they fear the effect it could have on an already overstretched Army and Marine Corps -- the two services bearing the brunt of the work in Iraq.
Casey has been mentioned as a possible choice for Army chief of staff or to replace Abizaid at Central Command.
Others that could be affected in a shuffle include:
# Army Lt. Gen. David Petraeus, who led the 101st Airborne Division during the 2003 Iraq invasion and later headed the effort to train Iraqi security forces. He most recently oversaw the rewriting of the Army and Marine field manual for counterinsurgencies.
# Army Lt. Gen. Peter Chiarelli, who last week finished his tour as the No. 2 general in Iraq, as commander of the multinational forces there.
# Army Lt. Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, also a former division commander in Iraq and now head of the Iraq training effort.
Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
<http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aRkNGw.LPui0&refer=home> Abizaid, Top U.S. Mideast Commander During Iraq War, to Retire
By Tony Capaccio
Dec. 20 (Bloomberg) -- General John Abizaid, the top U.S. commander in the Middle East during most of the Iraq war, said today that he will retire in mid-March.
Abizaid has opposed a major increase in U.S. troops in Iraq -- an idea President George W. Bush is considering -- saying extra forces would only increase Iraqis' dependency on U.S. forces and strain a U.S. military that's already stretched.
Abizaid, at a press conference in Baghdad today, said ``the time is right'' for his retirement and ``it has nothing to do with dissatisfaction'' with U.S. strategy in the war. Abizaid was with new Defense Secretary Robert Gates who's in Iraq to reassess that strategy.
Abizaid, 55, is the longest-serving head of the U.S. Central Command, with authority over more than 200,000 U.S. troops in the Middle East, South Asia and the Horn of Africa. He began in July 2003 what was supposed to be a 3-year stint in the post and agreed to stay on until early 2007 at the request of former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, said Major Matt McLaughlin, a Centcom spokesman.
Testifying at a Nov. 15 hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Abizaid said he did ``not believe that more American troops right now is the solution'' to quelling the sectarian violence in Iraq, now at an all-time high.
Discussing the issue with reporters several weeks before, he made this point: ``Every time American troops operate in large numbers, it creates a dynamic where Iraqi troops do less. It's very important that Iraqi troops take responsibility for military operations in their own country.''
Moreover, adding troops in Iraq would strain military missions elsewhere, he said. ``Where do you think they would come from?'' he asked.
Independent Views
Abizaid, during the Nov. 15 hearing, became one of the first active-duty military officials to say that then-Army Chief of Staff General Eric Shinseki was correct when he told the armed services panel in February 2003 that the U.S. would need ``several hundred thousand'' troops to stabilize a postwar Iraq - - an assessment roundly rejected at the time by Rumsfeld and his then-deputy Paul Wolfowitz.
Abizaid disagreed publicly with Rumsfeld as early as July 16, 2003, when he told a press conference that the U.S. faced a ``classical guerrilla-type campaign'' in Iraq.
Rumsfeld in an earlier press conference said ``I don't use the phase `guerrilla war' because there isn't one.''
The book ``State of Denial'' by Washington Post editor Bob Woodward, Abizaid as telling visitors to his Qatar headquarters in 2005 that Rumsfeld ``has no credibility anymore.'' Abizaid denied making the remark.
A native of Coleville, California and the grandson of Lebanese Christian immigrants, Abizaid is fluent in Arabic and attended the University of Amman in Jordan before earning a master's degree in Middle Eastern studies from Harvard University.
To contact the reporter on this story: Tony Capaccio in Washington at acapaccio at bloomberg.net Last Updated: December 20, 2006 13:04 EST
-- Yoshie <http://montages.blogspot.com/> <http://mrzine.org> <http://monthlyreview.org/>