Obama Crafts New Plans For Iraq, Afghanistan

On his busy first day in office, President Barack Obama ordered military commanders, Joint Chiefs, national security advisers and Defense Secretary Robert Gates to launch a comprehensive review of Iraq policy.

Thirty-eight days later, Obama had his new Iraq plan, and he chose to unveil the strategy at Camp Lejeune, N.C., before a rapt audience of Marines. The plan centered on three goals: a responsible combat troop pullout, sustained diplomacy and comprehensive "engagement" in the Mideast.

"Let me say this as plainly as I can," Obama told the assembled Marines, "by August 31, 2010, our combat mission in Iraq will end."

Obama entered the Oval Office with a mountain of challenges to tackle, including the meltdown of the U.S. economy. But also at the top of his agenda was setting a new plan for U.S. involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In his Feb. 27 speech, Obama said that the United States would pare its 142,000 combat troops to a transitional force of 35,000 to 50,000 by August 2010. Those residual forces would have three jobs, he said: train, equip and advise Iraqi security forces, conduct counter-terrorism missions and protect ongoing civilian and military initiatives.

All U.S. forces would be withdrawn by the end of 2011, Obama said.

"As we carry out this drawdown, my highest priority will be the safety and security of our troops and civilians in Iraq," Obama said.

The plan marked one notable shift in his position from his campaign -- an extended timetable of 19 months for withdrawal, instead of 16.

After the Lejeune speech, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Adm. Mike Mullen and Defense Secretary Robert Gates promptly outlined their support for the plan.

Mullen, who in July had said setting timetables was dangerous, said after Obama's speech that he was comfortable with the president's strategy. Mullen explained on March 1 on "Fox News Sunday" that the conditions had improved "fairly dramatically," thanks in part to the surge, and were now right for Iraqi leaders to successfully take control of the country.

Gates told NBC's "Meet the Press" on March 1 that it was "fairly remote" that changing conditions in Iraq would alter Obama's plan, although he noted that Obama has the authority to change the strategy if U.S. security is endangered.

After August 2010, troops would be consolidated in a smaller number of bases for their protection, Gates said. The risk to troops there has gradually declined, Gates said.

Obama acknowledged that Iraq was not yet secure and that there would be "difficult periods and tactical adjustments" as the U.S. withdraws.

That put it mildly, said critics of the plan, many of whom predict a dramatic increase in violence as August 2010 approaches.

Obama should have given himself more flexibility, said Meghan O'Sullivan, a Harvard lecturer and deputy national security adviser for Iraq and Afghanistan from 2005 to 2007.

"What is more important -- adherence to the 18-month timetable or safeguarding Iraqi and regional stability?" O'Sullivan said in the Washington Post.

Other critics noted that political stability has not increased as security in Iraq has improved. Disputes inside Iraq remain on fundamental issues, including whether the nation's constitution is supreme law and how Iraq's regions should share in the country's rich resources, critics say.

"The United States will not be able to leave behind a stable and functioning Iraq until these disputes are resolved," Qubad J. Talabani, representative of the Kurdistan Regional Government to the United States, told the Post.

Obama Puts Renewed Attention On Afghanistan

Obama's strategy in Iraq is tied to his plan for Afghanistan, where the president said he would send an additional 17,000 troops this spring and summer, a hefty boost to the 36,000 already there. Even more could be committed after further review, the White House said.

Al-Qaida is supporting a resurgent Taliban and threatens America from its posts along the Pakistani border, Obama said. The troops are needed to "stabilize a deteriorating situation in Afghanistan, which has not received the strategic attention, direction and resources it urgently requires," the president said in announcing the decision Feb. 17.

Obama added that the problem of Afghanistan cannot be solved by troops alone, stressing his plans for more diplomacy and development there.

The administration has said it plans to press U.S. allies in NATO to commit more troops. Obama also aims to invest more in Afghanistan�s economic development.

White House officials also have said they plan to demand the Afghan government do more to improve security in the country, including weeding out corruption and squelching the thriving illicit opium trade.

Some experts say challenges in Afghanistan are even thornier than those in Iraq.

Critics argue that troop increases could be counterproductive in Afghanistan, given resentment there for U.S. forces. Critics also have argued that Obama is escalating spending and stretching troops thin for a war with an undefined mission.

After seven years, the U.S. has not broken al-Qaida or the Taliban, has not found Osama bin Laden, and the Afghan government is still "woefully corrupt and ineffective," argued New York Times columnist Bob Herbert.

"Instead of cutting our losses, we appear to be doubling down," he wrote.

Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., on March 3 said he was uneasy with Obama's plan to raise troop levels before a goal was defined. He estimated it would take 600,000 troops to quell violence there.

Obama's plan amounts to a troop shuffling from Iraq to Afghanistan that won't work, Andrew J. Bacevich, a Boston University international relations professor, said in the Washington Post. The U.S. has achieved modest and tenuous gains in Iraq, he noted.

"To imagine that simply trying harder in Afghanistan and Pakistan will produce a happier outcome is surely a fantasy," he said.