Washiington, January 16: The United States plans to maintain a permanent military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan and the talk of withdrawals is just a public relations move, a US political analyst says.
“This happens gradually. There is a small extension for a couple of years and then another extension for another couple of years, but ultimately our plan is to stay there permanently,” political activist Dahlia Wasfi told Media.
“Back in 2003, when the invasion [of Iraq] happened, there was a promise that this would be a short war that ‘we’ll be in, we’ll be out’ and then it will be over,” she added.
Wasfi also dismissed the deadlines for pulling troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan, saying it is “a public relations effort to sell continued occupation to the American people.”
“The idea of setting a deadline is to give the American people and maybe the Iraqis an idea that there is a plan to leave,” she argued.
On Thursday, US Vice President Joe Biden paid an unannounced visit to Iraq to discuss the issue of extending a December 31, 2011 deadline for US troops to leave Iraq.
The last US combat brigade left the country in August 2010, seven years after the US-led invasion of Iraq.
Though combat operations have officially ended, about 50,000 US troops will remain in the country until the end of 2011 to “advise Iraqi forces and protect US interests.”
———Agencies