Washington, October 02: Gaining the upper hand against Al-Qaeda in Iraq has required a big US military force coupled with manhunts against militant leaders, the American commander there said on Thursday.
“You have to have both combined,” General Ray Odierno, the commander of US forces in Iraq, told a news conference.
Al-Qaeda did not have a presence in Iraq, and observers say they are likely to remain in Iraq as long as US troops remain there because of their eagerness to follow and fight American military presence in the region.
Where there is little visible US presence, they add, there is usually little or no Al-Qaeda operations in the region.
Contrary to US “propaganda”, analysts believe that Al-Qaeda is more likely to leave Iraq in the absence of US occupation or military presence.
Odierno claimed “success” against the Iraqi branch of Al-Qaeda could not have been achieved solely with a “counter-terrorism” approach — using a smaller elite force targeting key enemy leaders.
It was crucial also to have a “counter-insurgency” campaign involving a large ground force across the country, he said.
“It takes a combination of both of these things to get after that,” he said.
“In order to effectively go after these elements, you have to have counter-insurgency operated by your conventional forces that then can be supplemented by counter-terrorism operations by your higher-end … forces,” Odierno said.
He said the US military had managed to “sever Al-Qaeda Iraq from mainstream Al Qaeda,” making it difficult for militants to communicate with Al-Qaeda’s leadership outside of the country.
Odierno, who was due to brief Barack Obama on Iraq after the press conference, is under pressure to free up troops and resources in Iraq for the Afghan mission.
Obama has set a deadline of August 2010 to withdraw all US combat troops from Iraq and leave behind a 50,000-strong advisory force. Under a security agreement with Baghdad, all US troops have to leave Iraq by the end of 2011.
Expressing cautious optimism about progress in Iraq, Odierno suggested he might start pulling troops out ahead of schedule depending on conditions after elections due in January.
He was less than precise about force levels over the next three months, saying there would be 110,000 to 120,000 troops in Iraq by the end of the year.
“There’s still some other decision points that we could make to off-ramp some other units around the first of the year, and we’re still taking a look at that.”
The US force in Iraq has been reduced from about 143,500 troops at the start of 2009 to about 124,000, Odierno told lawmakers on Wednesday.
The US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 is viewed by critics as an ‘act of aggression’ that violated international law.
Subsequent US occupation policies caused the country to descend into almost total chaos, bordering on civil war.
An estimated 1.3 million Iraqis have been killed in Iraq as a direct result of the invasion, while millions more have fled the country.
Critics argue that the recent stability announced in the country should not excuse the ‘crime’ of invading Iraq, calling for the prosecution of the war’s architects for ‘crimes against humanity’
—Agencies